AUTO BUZZ
CEO defends killing off Pontiac GMC and Buick survive the cuts, while Saturn, Saab and Hummer will be gone by the end of the yearFrom Thursday's Globe and Mail
April 30, 2009 at 12:00 AM EDT
As he faced the media this week and announced the death of the Pontiac brand, GM CEO Fritz Henderson testily defended the decision by attacking "frankly disconcerting" coverage of whether it should have been the GMC truck brand or Buick to receive the axe.
GM executives have been very protective of Buick, not because it's been burning up the sales charts in North America — in fact far from it — but because of the brand's popularity in China.
GM is trying to spare the growing Chinese market as much as possible from the unrelenting cuts needed in its shrivelling home market; even though vehicle sales have dropped in China, it's still a huge market.
GMC, on the other hand, has virtually no presence outside North America, as well as no products that are not nearly identical to trucks offered by Chevrolet, in both looks and price.
PhotogalleryIn essence, it is a badge-engineered brand, needing little investment to differentiate its products, but racking up sizable sales by its huge distribution network selling what for many years were GM's most profitable models — pickup trucks and large SUVs.
"Our view is that both of these brands [Buick and GMC] should be core brands, because they're both highly profitable brands," said Henderson. "I've read lots of coverage that is frankly disconcerting about Buick and GMC, because they made no business sense to me."
These disconcerting views may have pointed out that GMC is profitable because it costs relative peanuts to change a Chevy Silverado into a GMC Sierra, for example, especially if the bean counters put all or most of the development costs for the popular pickups on the Chevy side of the ledger. GM has publicly vowed for a generation to end the brand engineering practice, acknowledging that it hurts the appeal of each brand, and has made a concerted effort to at least visually differentiate vehicles sharing similar or identical oily bits under the skin.
That's why there was so much surprise over the decision to kill Pontiac, because it did have a clearer brand mandate as well as unique products, namely the Solstice convertible (unique at least after the planned chopping of Saturn and its Sky drop-top) and the Vibe hatchback, just introduced as a 2009 model last year.
Henderson said that neither model will be rebadged for another GM brand, although he did say there were still negotiations to take place about the Vibe with Toyota, GM's joint-venture partner in the NUMMI plant in California where the Vibe — the 2009 AJAC Best New Economy Car over $18,000 — is built.
It's likely the Vibe will outlast the rest of the Pontiac line into 2010, as the Australian-built G8 and most of its other products will be phased out by the end of this year, said Henderson.
Saturn, Saab and Hummer will also be sold or killed by the end of 2009, if not before, he said.
The loss of Pontiac will be a major blow to many Canadian dealers, where the brand often represented the least-expensive and best-selling models, which drives traffic to dealers' more lucrative service department. Unlike in the United States, none of these GM brands had stand-alone dealers in Canada.
"All of our Pontiac dealers also sell Buick and GMC, and half also sell Chevy or Cadillac models," said GM Canada spokesman Tony LaRocca. "Our go-forward strategy is to grow the product offerings of Buick and GMC — both successful and profitable brands."
Volt in Canada by late-summer 2011
Despite all the hype around the Chevrolet Volt and the race to its planned November, 2010, debut, Canadians will have to wait until late-summer 2011 for the Volt to arrive in dealers here, according to vehicle line director Tony Posawatz.
The Volt will arrive in Canada nine months after its U.S. debut, he told Volt enthusiast site gm-volt.com.
Small Fiat sedan shown to Chrysler dealers
In a sneak preview at Chrysler's Auburn Hills, Mich., HQ intended to boost morale and optimism, the company showed its dealers a small Fiat sedan that will reportedly become the basis of a new entry-level model for the brand.
Besides the redesigned Jeep Grand Cherokee shown at the New York auto show earlier this month, and a revised Chrysler 300, Montreal-raised lead designer Ralph Gilles also rolled out a small Fiat sedan that he said would underpin an upcoming Chrysler, The Wall Street Journal's website reported.
The report noted that Gilles said the "small sport sedan" would receive new styling by Chrysler, and while the report didn't note the model shown, the car is believed to be the Fiat Bravo, a small hatchback that is the only car that comes up on Fiat's Italian website when searching for a compact sedan.
This of course assumes that the merger goes ahead and that Chrysler staves off bankruptcy, both of which were still uncertain as we went to press.
New Ferrari site allows virtual track time
Italian car maker and dream spinner Ferrari launched an impressive redesign of its website a few weeks back, which allows you to virtually test drive the car you configure yourself on Ferrari's famed Mugello race track, as well as take a spin in each of Ferrari's current lineup with Michael Schumacher.
It's a pretty serious effort, as many of the videos are in HD, and shot with vibration-damped cameras, important when you're bombing along in a Scuderia at more than 200 km/h.
The ferrari.com site also allows visitors to view video tours of the Maranello plant complex, starting with the distinctive red front archway, to the Galleria museum and the wind tunnel where Formula One cars are tested throughout the year.
In all, it now boasts more than 600 video clips, and thousands of car, race and historical photos.
Formula One fans will also be impressed with the live telemetry readings available on race weekends, and can follow along on blogs by both Kimi Raikkonnen and Felipe Massa, even if the Ferrari F1 drivers are not quite the most active bloggers around.
Click
No comments:
Post a Comment