Posted on 04/11/2013 5:36:45 PM PDT by Olog-hai
General Motors will invest €4 billion ($5.2 billion) in its troubled German subsidiary Opel and its British sister brand Vauxhall by 2016, the US auto giant has announced.
“As a global automotive company, GM needs a strong presence in Europe, in terms of design and development as well as manufacturing and sales,” GM chairman and chief executive Dan Akerson said at Opel headquarters in Rüsselsheim near Frankfurt late on Wednesday. …
The German car maker has been making losses for years as it has been slow to react to the crisis in demand for cars in Europe, by far its biggest market, and GM has ordered Opel’s management to prescribe draconian cost-cutting. …
(Excerpt) Read more at thelocal.de ...
The German auto buyer will typically demand a quality vehicle.
If GM hopes to compete in Germany, it has to upgrade its product line ....
There’s a big gold grab going on by the EU’s central government (Cyprus just had to surrender, I mean sell three-quarters of their gold to the ECB). If the euro suddenly gets reborn as a gold-backed currency, that could turn things around.
Good to know that they have enough money to do that but not enough to finish paying their debt to the American taxpayers who kept them alive.
The last and only Opels worth mentioning, that I recall ever existing in the U.S., were the Opel GT, and the Manta series. That was somewhere in the mid-70’s, the same timeframe that saw Ford sell a Mustang with no guts and no soul, that GM came out with something called a Chevette (phonetically misspelled, of course).
Opel had two of the top ten best-selling cars in Europe within the last couple years.
Most of Europe’s automakers have financial woes in their local markets.
A number of Saturns were based on Opels, IIRC.
The newer small Buicks (Regal, Encore, Verano) are Opel models as well, and even the LaCrosse is an Opel platform.
And I just finished working onmy 70 Opel Autocross car!
Mine is bored out .080 to a 2.0 liter, 12.5 : 1 compression solid lifter cam, ported polished 1.5 liter head and drilled out the valves to put small block chevy valves in it. Smoked the factory clutch, so now it has a Chevy S10 clutch, BMW brakes and a lowered suspension, giant sway bars etc. Been a real riot to play with and even when I lose, the car looks great doing it!
Didn’t WE give GE BILLIONS and BILLIONS to BAIL OUT the UNIONS????? Where are we getting this money to buy VAUXHALL??? OMG!
It's such a simple question it probably will never get answered.
Is our perfidious government secretly funding this investment with our tax dollars, partially or fully?
I perused the article and such a minor detail wasn't even addressed.....which is why I smell a rat.
Everyone apparently gets so hung up on the design and power details of the auto itself that the BIG QUESTION is left hanging. How is the U.S. benefitting from this deal?
How many desperate Detroit workers will be hired in this Billion Dollar Baby deal? How many ravaged GM facilities in Detroit/Beirut will be rehabilitated?
How many MPG the German cars will get is NOT the question de jour.
Leni
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.