AUTOS

Renault to Build Brazilian Assembly Plant: The French car company, in a drive to step up production in faster-growing foreign markets, said it will spend $1 billion to build an assembly plant in Brazil. Renault’s project illustrates a growing trend by European auto makers to reduce their dependence on the sluggish home car market, which is expected to grow 2% annually on average until the end of the decade. This year the European market is expected to be flat. Renault’s plant in Brazil, the world’s seventh-largest car market, will bolster its presence in the promising Mercosur trade cooperative zone, which also includes Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay. State-controlled Renault said the Brazilian plant will produce about 100,000 vehicles a year.