In the US, there are a number of entrepreneurs who believe they can make a fortune importing cars and unloading them on the American public. It was done in the 1940s and 1950s...and worked. We got VW, MG, Triumph, BMW, etc...that way.
In the 1960s, Malcolm Bricklin and his associates did a similar thing; they imported the Subaru 360. When the 360 went sour on the American market, they turned up the heat on Fuji Heavy Industries (the maker of Subaru cars) and they got the Subaru "Star"...known in the US as the FF-1. It sold well enough to keep the brand going. Subaru now actually builds vehicles in North America and is doing quite well.
Bricklin sold his stake in Subaru of American and went on to build his own car (1974-76 Bricklin), but it failed. In the 1980s, he acquired the rights to import the Fiat 2000 Spider (Pininfarina Azzura) and Fiat X1/9 (Bertone X1/9) when Fiat withdrew from the market. His new company also gained the rights to import cars from Zastava of Yugoslavia and Proton of Malaysia. The Yugo was introduced in the US in August 1985, the Proton was never imported. Yugo America folded in 1991.
Now, he's back. He wants to import the Zastava cars again, this time calling them ZMW (Zastava Motor Works). I don't expect the cars to sell nearly as well as they did in the 1980s.
Bricklin's not alone in this desire. There have been people in the past 5-10 years who have announced that they were going to import cars and trucks from all over the world and sell them in the US. We've been told that we would be able to buy the ARO from Romania, the UAZ from Russia, and the JPX from Brazil, among others. I've even heard talk of the Russian Volga coming and the Russian Oka has been announced to be available in the US this year.
While people complain that the Nissan Skyline GT-R, TVR, and McLaren F1 aren't/weren't offered in the US, the American market is one of the most competitive and is THE market for any major manufacturer to be in (of the world's largest makers, we don't have Peugeot-Citroen and Renault, unless you count Nissan). I'll let you international guys know what happens to ZMW (and Oka, if you care).