DriveInside.com | Monday July 19, 2010
General Motors India (GM India) will soon be launching a separate advertising campaign for online media. The company will start with a campaign to promote the Chevrolet Cruze, followed by six others. GM’s decision to creative exclusive online content to advertise its products comes in the light of more and more customers researching cars on the Read More...
DriveInside.com | Monday July 5, 2010
Most car companies in India posted a double-digit growth in their domestic sales in June 2010, with General Motors and Ford India growing by as much as 112 percent and 267 percent respectively. The two American companies owe their success largely to the popularity of their small cars Chevrolet Beat and Ford Figo. Tata Motors, too, saw a 63 percent Read More...
DriveInside.com | Wednesday June 30, 2010
A number of auto companies in India have decided to hike vehicle prices, with raw material costs unlikely to be contained any time soon. While General Motors India has announced that its cars will be costlier by up to 2 percent from July 5, 2010, commercial vehicle manufacturer, Ashok Leyland, too, has hiked prices by Rs 20,000-Rs 50,000 across Read More...
DriveInside.com | Monday June 28, 2010
General Motors India has started working on the development of its new compact car to be positioned under the Chevrolet Spark. The company will use the low-cost manufacturing expertise of its Chinese partner, Shanghai Auto, to develop the car. GM India President and MD, Mr Karl Slym, said that the company would not import components from China, Read More...
DriveInside.com | Monday June 21, 2010
Auto companies in India have significantly increased their spending on digital marketing over the past year. According to industry observers, Maruti Suzuki, Honda Siel, Hyundai India and General Motors India are now investing at least 10 percent of their total advertising budgets online. These companies are targeting customers aged between 25 and Read More...
DriveInside.com | Friday June 11, 2010
American auto company, General Motors, recently sent a memo to its employees at Chevrolet, explaining to them the importance of consistency in branding. The company’s heads want employees to communicate their brand only as ‘Chevrolet’, and to stop using the term ‘Chevy’ while “talking to a dealer, reviewing dealer advertising, or speaking with Read More...
DriveInside.com | Monday June 7, 2010
The Indian auto industry continued to grow at a rapid pace in May 2010, in spite of repeated price hikes following the announcement of Budget 2010. Maruti Suzuki did particularly well, posting its highest ever domestic sales in the month at 90,041 units – 27 percent higher than its sales in May 2009. The company’s total sales in May 2010 stood at Read More...
DriveInside.com | Monday June 7, 2010
General Motors India (GM India) plans to start producing a 1-litre diesel engine for the Chevrolet Beat at its Talegaon facility in Maharashtra. GM India Vice President (Sales, Marketing and Services), Mr Ankush Arora, told mediapersons that company would roll out a diesel engine for the Beat at the beginning of 2011. The existing variants of the Read More...
DriveInside.com | Friday May 28, 2010
General Motors India (GM India) will be launching Light Commercial Vehicles (LCVs) along with its Chinese partner, Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation (SAIC), by the end of 2011. The JV will manufacture LCVs at GM’s Halol plant at an investment of several million dollars. While SAIC’s passenger cars will carry the Chevrolet badge when Read More...
DriveInside.com | Thursday May 27, 2010
The Chevrolet Cruze is giving tough competition to the much older Chevrolet Optra, with the latter’s sales falling by 5 to 10 percent ever since the Cruze was launched. While the base variant of the Cruze is priced at Rs 11.39 lakh, the top-end variant of the Optra costs Rs 10.62 lakh. A number of customers walking into GM showrooms to buy the Read More...
DriveInside.com | Thursday May 27, 2010
General Motors India has decided to end its alliance with Reva Electric Car Company, following the latter’s tie-up with M&M. GM India Vice President and Director, Mr P. Balendran, told mediapersons that the company “may not continue the Spark electric vehicle programme with Reva” and that it would pursue its own electric vehicle programme. Read More...
DriveInside.com | Monday May 24, 2010
General Motors India will not be launching the electric version of its small car, Chevrolet Spark, in September 2010 as was decided earlier. The company has not yet decided on whether to use lead-acid batteries or lithium-ion batteries in the car. While the latter have a relatively longer running span of approximately 150 km on a single charge, Read More...
DriveInside.com | Wednesday May 5, 2010
While GM and Ford have seen a considerable increase in their sales in India following the launch of their small cars Beat and Figo, Volkswagen is yet to make a mark with its Polo, possibly because of its higher price. The VW Polo comes at a starting price of Rs 4.34 lakh (ex-showroom, Delhi), compared to Rs 3.49 lakh for the Figo and Rs 3.41 lakh Read More...
DriveInside.com | Wednesday April 21, 2010
General Motors India will launch an electric version of its compact car Spark, in collaboration with Reva Electric Car Company (RECC), by the end of 2010. Mr P Balendran, Director and Vice President, GM India, said that the launch of the ‘E-Spark’ would be in line with the company’s commitment to producing eco-friendly vehicles for the Indian Read More...
DriveInside.com | Wednesday April 14, 2010
General Motors India will be investing $50 million at its plant in Halol, Gujarat, to produce Light Commercial Vehicles (LCVs) with Chinese partner Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation (SAIC). The new range of products will be launched in 2011. Mr Karl Slym, President and MD of GM India, told mediapersons that the company would have to upgrade Read More...
DriveInside.com | Thursday April 8, 2010
American automaker General Motors has reported a net loss of $4.3 billion in the six months following its emergence from bankruptcy protection in July 2009. GM Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell said that while the results for 2009 showed that the company still needed to do a lot of work, he believed that it could return to profitability in Read More...
DriveInside.com | Monday March 22, 2010
The South Korean unit of General Motors has announced the recall of close to 60,000 units of the Chevrolet Captiva and the Chevrolet Cruze, to correct a fault in the steering wheels of the vehicles. The recall includes 45,957 units of the Captiva, manufactured between April 1, 2006 and December 31, 2007 and 12,604 units of the Cruze, manufactured Read More...
DriveInside.com | Saturday March 13, 2010
General Motors Vice Chairman, Robert A. Lutz, who will retire from the company this spring, said last week that GM would not capitalize on its Japanese competitor Toyota’s recalls. He said that it was unlikely for Toyota customers to switch directly to Ford or Chevrolet, and that there was little transference between domestic buyers and import Read More...
DriveInside.com | Monday March 8, 2010
All vehicle segments in India continued to grow in February 2010 on the back of new launches and the expected price-hike in the coming months. Almost all passenger car companies announced an increase in their vehicle prices after the excise-duty was hiked last week. There will be a further increase in prices in April, following the implementation Read More...
DriveInside.com | Monday March 8, 2010
American car companies, General Motors and Ford, may be able to win over a good share of erstwhile Toyota loyalists if they continue to focus on quality. Until its recent spate of car recalls, Toyota was considered the most reliable of all auto companies in the US. However, customers are now seriously considering switching to GM or Ford, which Read More...
DriveInside.com | Sunday March 7, 2010
General Motors will be focusing increasingly on India, China and Brazil to expand its business in the coming years. The company’s President, Mr Timothy E Lee, said last week that India offered a very good opportunity to GM to grow its Chevrolet brand, a process which is already well under way with the Chevrolet Cruze and the Chevrolet Beat Read More...
DriveInside.com | Wednesday March 3, 2010
US-based auto company, General Motors, is planning to recall 1.3 million units of the Chevrolet Cobalt and three models of the Pontiac brand to replace a motor in the power steering systems of the cars. GM announced the recall plan after US authorities received over 1,000 complaints regarding the cars’ power steering. These included 14 car Read More...
DriveInside.com | Saturday February 27, 2010
A number of auto companies in the country have hiked car prices following the announcement of Budget 2010-11 last week, which increased the excise duty on all non-oil products from 8 percent to 10 percent. The excise duty on bigger cars, which stood at 20 percent earlier, has also gone up to 22 percent. The companies that have announced definitive Read More...
DriveInside.com | Wednesday February 24, 2010
General Motors (GM) India this week introduced an automatic version of the Chevrolet Cruze, priced at Rs 13.7 lakh. The Cruze was launched in India in October 2009, and has been doing remarkably well in the country. The new Automatic Transmission (AT) version of the car is expected to push up its monthly sales by 250 units.
GM India Vice Read More...
DriveInside.com | Friday February 12, 2010
General Motors India will be doubling production at its Talegaon plant in Maharashta in March 2010. GM India Vice President, Mr P Balendran, told mediapersons that the company had earlier decided to increase output and start a second production shift at Talegaon from June 2010. However, this will now be done in March itself because of increasing Read More...