General Motors Challenges Volkswagen China Market Rearrangement

In the history of American autos, there is only one female CEO. She is Mary Bola, GM’s chairman and chief executive officer. The “Iron Lady” came to China earlier and elaborated on the future development blueprint of General Motors in China. At the same time, he explicitly challenged Volkswagen and vowed to FAW-Volkswagen and even SAIC-Volkswagen to take over and take over the Chinese market. Sales volume is the top spot.

According to Ms. Bora’s blueprint for GM’s blueprint for the future, three key points can be clearly outlined: First, electrification promotes energy conservation and emission reduction; second, autopilot technology improves traffic safety; and third, intelligent network connection and sharing model improves traffic congestion. . It can be said that this is an ideal blueprint that is full of cultural temperature. What is even more impressive is that it incorporates female-specific emotional components.

General Motors is committed to promoting changes in the way the world travels. The Chinese market is particularly important, and it is also the market with the greatest opportunities. Therefore, GM announced that it will stop car sales in India and shift future investment to more lucrative markets such as China and Brazil. The Chinese market is also very much in love with GM. In 2016, GM's retail sales in China reached a record high of 3.87 million units, which accounted for 40% of global sales. This will not be the GM's largest market in the world.

The Debate between GM and Volkswagen in China has already entered a brand new stage. In particular, under the background of the transformation of the Chinese automobile market as a whole to the new energy and intelligent network united universities, apart from the wisdom of the leadership, the competition is more about the future. The ability to integrate resources.

GM is making every effort to build "four modernizations"

GM's vision of the future blueprint for the Chinese market accurately describes the “new four modernizations” of “electricity, network, intelligence, and sharing”. With its continuous innovation and transformation, it is calmly facing continuous industrial changes and markets. competition.

In fact, GM has long been a leader in the field of electrification because electrification is a key element of GM’s global strategy. According to the plan, GM will launch at least 10 new energy vehicles in China between 2016 and 2020, including the currently sold Cadillac CT6 plug-in hybrid vehicle, Buick Velite 5 extended-range hybrid vehicle and Baojun E100 pure electric vehicle. car. At the same time, the average CO2 emissions of GM’s full line of products will be reduced by 28% during this period. By 2025, all models of the Buick, Chevrolet and Cadillac brands will use varying degrees of electrification technology, bringing a complete solution from light mixing to pure electric. In order to meet the battery needs of new energy vehicles, SAIC GM has also established its own battery assembly plant and will be officially put into operation by the end of this year.

At present, most of the hundreds of automobile brands in China are building intelligent network-linked vehicles. The general nature of being the leader can't be reconciled. The goal of GM is that by 2020, all products of Buick, Chevrolet and Cadillac in the Chinese market will be interconnected. At the same time, on the road to autopilot, GM is currently working on two paths. Among them, the super cruising path can release both hands at a high speed. This fall, the Cadillac CT6 equipped with this technology will be released in the United States and will be introduced to the Chinese market in a future Cadillac model.

In addition, the car sharing trip is even more a mess, and GM has also laid out its layout early. Last year, GM established Maven, its own vehicle sharing service brand. In the Chinese market, it chose to invest in a time-share leasing technology service provider and also piloted employee carpooling platform projects. At present, the pilot project for sharing vehicles with Shanghai Jiaotong University has already run nearly 90,000 kilometers on campus.

Two major "opportunities" in the Chinese market

This year, General Motors has made drastic changes in a series of reforms, mainly to change the direction of investment. For example, in March of this year, General Motors sold its Opel/Vauxhall and General Motors Europe operations to French automakers for 2.2 billion euros. Business PSA; Two months later, General Motors announced a series of restructurings and exits in overseas markets, including the departure of General Motors' Chevrolet brand from South Africa and Europe.

However, for the Chinese market, GM's investment has increased repeatedly. Qian Huikang, executive vice president of General Motors and president of General Motors China, once said that GM’s profitability in China is good, and the business benefits of its joint venture will also support GM’s further investment in the Chinese market.

Relevant data show that in August this year, the total sales volume of GM in the Chinese market was 328,425 vehicles, an increase of 12% year-on-year, hitting a record high, and Baojun and Chevrolet, in particular, have seen a reversal. From January to August this year, the total sales volume of General Motors in China reached 2.38 million. “Golden 9 Silver 10” and the end of the year, using the heat of the market, to maintain the current sales rhythm, surpassing sales last year is a must-see.

The Chinese market is so important. For GM, there are two very important development opportunities. First of all, in the luxury car field, Cadillac has the opportunity to further expand, and the sales momentum continues to improve. In addition, General Motors will further provide value-added services to customers in terms of smart interconnection and electrification, and it will also receive strong support from government policies.

For the future development, GM has pressed a lot of bets, of which the US market and the Chinese market are their biggest stacks. The increase in product sales across the board, this achievement does allow GM to see a huge hope of winning. However, the rapid growth of terminal sales or single-brand is no longer the only goal pursued by this long-established American automobile brand. OLA, led by Bola, began to try to become a provider of travel mode services and worldwide Build a new travel ecology within. General Motors will invest more money in future visions and opportunities. It is hoped that it will soon become a representative of the US Department of Luxury travel mode.

Single out the public

General Motors also operates three major brands in the Chinese market, including Buick, Chevrolet and Cadillac. Analyzed from the good results achieved since the beginning of this year, Cadillac in the luxury market segment should remember its merits. In August alone, sales of new cars in China exceeded 15,000, an increase of 51% year-on-year, and double-digit growth has been maintained for 18 consecutive months. So one of GM’s goals is to get Cadillac into the first camp of luxury brands.

Zhang Zhiyong, a senior analyst in the automotive industry, told the Times Weekly reporter: “From the perspective of sales volume and growth of single models, the difference between Cadillac XT5 and Mercedes-Benz GLC, Audi Q5, Cadillac ATS-L and Audi A4L, Mercedes-Benz E-class and BMW 5 Series. Both are significantly smaller. However, Cadillac and BBA brands still have a monthly average of 50,000 vehicles in terms of overall sales."

Cadillac’s plan is to introduce 10 new models by 2020 to form a 12-seater car segment covering SUVs, cars, and convertibles. In other words, Cadillac is planning to be among the first-tier luxury camps for three years.

Since the sudden advance of a single brand still requires time, then GM has another goal, which is to combine the power of the three brands to surpass Volkswagen.

However, in Zhang Zhiyong's view, the difficulty of achieving this goal is not small. SAIC Volkswagen has been sitting in the top spot for a few years with a complete product line and the assistance of Skoda; FAW-Volkswagen is still sitting on Diaoyutai by relying on the two gold-signed signs of Volkswagen and Audi; SAIC-GM's sales are only ranked first. Three.

Last year, North and South VW added more than 3 million vehicles. The FAW-Volkswagen's current disadvantage in sales growth seems to give the opportunity to catch up with the general public. To this end, Zhang Zhiyong believes that FAW-Volkswagen's product end is not perfect, the lack of SUV, lost a lot of sales. Whether GM can surpass FAW-Volkswagen, the key lies in the remaining 3 months of this year.

In the sprint of the last three months of this year, General Motors has a lot of powerful "weapons", such as Baojun 510 automatic models and Wuling Hongguang S3, in addition to the launch of Buick's new MPV GL6, which are expected to further boost sales. increase.