Karl-Thomas Neumann has been chairman of Vauxhall-Opel for just over a year. In that time, parent company GM has firmed up its European strategy, pulled Chevrolet out of Europe and started to co-develop new models with PSA Peugeot-Citroën.
An electrical engineer by training, Neumann joined GM from Volkswagen, where he was running the group’s interests in China. Previously, he was VW’s head of electronics R&D.
GM has been recovering from the darks days of chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2009. How is the European recovery going?
“We said we will break even in the middle of the decade, the latest by 2016. Last year we improved our result by 50 per cent. For the first time for 14 years, we kept market share.”
Can you update us on your joint ventures with PSA?
“Last year we sorted a number of things out and I met [new PSA boss] Carlos Tavares on his first day, shook his hand and said this is how we are progressing. Number one is logistics; this is the simplest. Last year we already saved around €60 million each. Second is purchasing and we now have the second-largest purchasing volume in Europe.”
What about shared car projects?
“We’re going to build three cars together: Meriva, Zafira and next-gen Combo van. We will do this on a PSA platform with PSA engines. We will make sure it is an Opel using some of our modules but their platform.” Why share platforms when GM has huge global volume?
“Vauxhall-Opel is the third-biggest car company in Europe — we sell one million cars a year — but this is not enough when you have the spectrum we do.”
You announced a project to co-develop a hatchback with PSA. Is that cancelled?
“We did have an agreement to build a next-generation small car. But it was a wrong decision, because our car would have left the GM platform programme. I prefer to use a GM platform for the small car because I can use our engines and technologies.”
Will there be more shared models/platforms with PSA?
“The three I mentioned and that’s it for the moment. There may be more in a few years.”
Vauxhall will challenge for number one spot in the UK. What progress is it making?
“Just to define it: we meant number one in retail and number one in true fleet. What we won’t do is chase number one for the pure sake of the number one spot and throw money at daily rental. Vauxhall will be run to get profitable business.” [New Vauxhall boss Tim Tozer contributed to this answer.]
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Quietly backing down
Not one word about great new products.....
Truth is they have an ageing range of mediocre cars, with very few highlights. They also need to fire their marketing company badly - they have been marketed so badly for so many years I'm not surprised their image is on the floor.
I had an astra as a rental
It was awful. Underpowered, crap gearbox, cheap interior and I've never seen so many buttons on a car.
The LED light loving fraternity are out in spades here....
A few (albeit personal) observations on this lot and VAG products:
1) They are happy and content supporting the (largely) German car industry (please THINK about that VAG guys - and not just in the usual anti-way but in terms of financial recovery of the UK - Astra at Ellsemere, Honda at Swindon etc etc),
2) Countless recent articles and the usual suspect surveys actually reveal that VAG products are quite often a pain in the ar*e (type in MK7 Golf problems into Google and find out for yourself). DSG problems - and don't give me the chestnut "but UK cars weren't affected" sh*te - in addition to trim, steering and suspension rattles on the MK7 Golf etc etc),
3) Seriously, if I see another broken down VW Passat or Audi A5 in my travels I will have to stop the car to avoid crashing in laughter,
4) Can't decide if the 1 series BMW rump or the back of the new Golf gets the 'most ugly rear-end' award,
5) The A1 and esp the soft-top version have got to be the most 'girly' looking car on the planet today - so, so annoying looking (almost up to pink Fiat 500 levels),
6) VAG products are so DARK inside. Lighten the **ck up!! (you only live once :@>); and
7) Audi's (in particular) look so, so, so similar to one another it's a joke - your ''upmarket" brand is not going to LOOK very upmarket for much longer.
OK so I'm being a little silly here (but I believe to have a good point or two).... but honestly, you German car lovers are doing my box in here....
I can't even escape to the 'other side' for reading intelligent comments on articles - their magazine is largely funded by German car industry!
Help!