Sovam, short for Société des Véhicules André Morin, is a French company best known for making airport utility vehicles and delivery trucks – but in the 1960s they delved headlong into the world of sports car manufacturing.Not unlike fellow French boutique cars makers Alpine, Sovam set about designing their car around Renault components, with a bespoke fiberglass body. The company was well-versed in the design and construction of fiberglass bodies on their industrial vehicles, so all they needed was a designer – which they found in Jacques Durand.Durand was a well-known designer in France, he’d been designing small sports cars with fiberglass bodies since the 1950s, so he was a perfect fit for Sovam.It was in 1966 that the company released their most popular model – the Sovam 1100VS. As the model number suggests, it was fitted with a new, larger engine – the 1108cc Renault Cléon-Fonte engine producing 65 hp, a 20 hp gain on its forebear.
This new engine gave the 570 kilogram car some genuine sporting credentials, although certainly not fast by today’s standards, the little French Sovam was capable of 105 mph.
