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In 1916 a decision was made to produce a Russian armoured car on the well known Austin chassis. Sixty chassis units – identical to those used in 3rd series – were ordered from Austin. The mission of building armoured hulls was entrusted to Putilovski Works, Saint Petersburg. It was planned to build the cars by July 1917, but work was virtually brought to halt by the February Revolution and the subsequent chaos. Not until March 1918 were the first cars produced. Later the production was transferred to Izhorski Works. A total of 33 vehicles were produced in 1918–1920. In contemporary Russian documents the model was referred to as Russian Austin (Russian: Русский Остин – Russkij Ostin), but eventually became better known as Austin-Putilov (Russian: Остин-Путиловец – Ostin-Putilovets).
Twelve hulls identical to those of Austin-Putilov were mounted on a Kégresse halftrack chassis, resulting in vehicles known as Austin-Kégresse. Production continued from July 1919 until March 1920 when it was stopped by shortage of materials and parts.
Russian Austins' most obvious features were diagonally placed MG turrets (in order to reduce width) and additional right side door. They also had MG mounts with better elevation and other minor improvements.