Westerberg. All the invoices related to the project was sent to Assar's private address at Kungsportsavenyn 32 in Gothenburg. In a lot of orders that Gustav Larsson made himself, he referred to Assar Gabrielsson as a "guarantee" that the deliveries would be paid by him personally. These details shows that the Volvo automobile project in the beginning was a true private project, not sponsored by SKF from an economic point of view. The first prototype car was ready in June 1926. Assar and Gustav took that first car and drove themselves, on bumpy roads, down to SKF in Gothenburg to show the SKF-board and now present the final investment plan. The automobile company AB Volvo is founded At a board meeting held in Hofors, Sweden on 10 August 1926, SKF decided to use the old subsidiary company Volvo AB, for the automobile project. AB Volvo, that was first registered in 1915 on the initiative of Björn Prytz, was originally set up to be used for a special series of ball bearings for the American market but it was never really used for this purpose. A small series of ball bearings stamped with Volvo was manufactured but it was never introduced on a larger scale. A contract was signed on 12 August 1926 between SKF and Assar, stipulating that all ten prototype cars, engineering drawings, calculations etc. should be handed over to Volvo AB and Assar in return would be refunded most of his private investments for the prototype cars. In other words, Assar Gabrielsson sold his project to AB Volvo. The contract was signed by Björn Prytz, managing director of SKF and Assar Gabrielsson. In the original contract from 16 December 1925 Assar stated that he might sell the automobile project to any company that would be interested, but of course hoped that SKF would be the company to stand first in line. Larsson also finally got paid for the initial engineering work with the ÖV4 according to the 'private' contract he and Assar had signed on 16 December 1925. Assar Gabrielsson left his position as sales manager for SKF and was appointed president and managing director for the 'new' Volvo AB on 1 January 1927. Gustav Larson was at the same time appointed vice president and technical manager and left his employment at AB Galco in Stockholm. The first series produced Volvo ÖV4 On 14 April 1927 at about