Holden brand to be retired from AU/NZ

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#2423476 18-Feb-2020 20:24

robjg63:
rb99:

Vauxhall/Opel was flogged to Peugeot I think. But I'm probably wrong again.

Nope. You are absolutely correct. Apparently PSA turned it from loss maker under GM to a profit of $587 million US within 12 months.
That probably just speaks volumes for the GM management ability. Don't forget they also went bust and required some pretty big loans from the US government a few years ago. To give them credit they did pay it back ahead of time.

It says nothing at all about the management. It is all down to the pension funds.

The GM Europe operations were deeply in the red because of the pension liabilities to current and former workers.

GM sold their European operations to PSA for a few billions. At the same time, GM gave PSA a rather larger sum of money for PSA to take over the pensions liability for the current workforce. GM retained liability for the pensions being paid to existing retirees and undertook to inject an additional $400 Million US every year for the next ten years into the pension fund for existing workers.

In essence, PSA were paid around US$1B to take Opel/Vauxhall off GM's hands and were relieved of the duty to fund a US$400M/yr pension liability.

It is not hard to see how PSA would turn O/V into a profitable business on that basis.

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jpoc

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#2423479 18-Feb-2020 20:36

The doom was there for all to see when GM sold Opel/Vauxhall to PSA a couple of years ago.

GM retained to right to sell the Holden range in ANZ and the supply was a mix of Holden badged RHD Vauxhalls, US produced Holden badged vehicles that were build up incorporating Vauxhall parts for the RHD sensitive components and Holden badged cars from Japan.

PSA had the right to sell O/V badged cars on the current GM platforms for a short time and only in their existing markets.

The end game would see a point at which GM had no RHD cars to sell here with a Holden badge so the badge and GM's operations here had to die.

Dratsab

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#2423494 18-Feb-2020 21:00

Scott3: Regarding the next police tender, it is rumored BMW was very competitive last time round. (The do emergency fitouts as part of the factory build, where every other brand does retrofits). They might have another crack.

My understanding is that under the All of Government contract system BMW were very competitive, to the point of being better priced than Holden. However I am lead to believe there were concerns from on high that police driving in BMW's "wouldn't be a good look".

The list of All of Government vehicle suppliers is here. For those speculating about Kia, note that they aren't on the list. Doesn't mean they won't be in the future.

Government procurement rule 58 specifies agencies *must* use contracted suppliers unless there is good reason not too. Given that the link to rule 58 says 'rule-55' there obviously also needs to be some rules established around logical naming conventions...

In regards to Holden exiting the RHD market, a bit of a surprise but not a great shock. The writing for something like this has been on the wall for a long time given all the struggles they've had.

Geektastic

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#2423533 18-Feb-2020 21:46

Dratsab:

Scott3: Regarding the next police tender, it is rumored BMW was very competitive last time round. (The do emergency fitouts as part of the factory build, where every other brand does retrofits). They might have another crack.

My understanding is that under the All of Government contract system BMW were very competitive, to the point of being better priced than Holden. However I am lead to believe there were concerns from on high that police driving in BMW's "wouldn't be a good look".

The list of All of Government vehicle suppliers is here. For those speculating about Kia, note that they aren't on the list. Doesn't mean they won't be in the future.

Government procurement rule 58 specifies agencies *must* use contracted suppliers unless there is good reason not too. Given that the link to rule 58 says 'rule-55' there obviously also needs to be some rules established around logical naming conventions...

In regards to Holden exiting the RHD market, a bit of a surprise but not a great shock. The writing for something like this has been on the wall for a long time given all the struggles they've had.

We had exactly that issue at a company I worked in when I was in the UK. We had about 2500 company cars because lots of staff needed to be mobile. BMW were cheaper than anyone else but did not get the contract for exactly the reason you state.

Idiocy.

Geektastic

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#2423534 18-Feb-2020 21:53

rb99:

Vauxhall/Opel was flogged to Peugeot I think. But I'm probably wrong again.

No, you're right. I checked and it was one or more of the GM factories that were flogged to the Chinese. My bad.

dafman

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#2423575 19-Feb-2020 07:13

It will be interesting to see what approach they take to getting rid of remaining new stock.

Dingbatt

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#2423648 19-Feb-2020 08:28

dafman: It will be interesting to see what approach they take to getting rid of remaining new stock.

Their ‘halo’ products will remain at their current prices. Everything else will drop to the level of Haval/Great Wall (or less). IMO.

“We’ve arranged a society based on science and technology, in which nobody understands anything about science technology. Carl Sagan 1996

frankv

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#2423896 19-Feb-2020 12:03

Dingbatt:

dafman: It will be interesting to see what approach they take to getting rid of remaining new stock.

Their ‘halo’ products will remain at their current prices. Everything else will drop to the level of Haval/Great Wall (or less). IMO.

Looks to me like the Holden brand would be available for Chinese manufacturers to purchase (e.g. MG, Volvo).

One wonders what the top of The Mountain will look like this year.

robjg63

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#2423953 19-Feb-2020 12:28

frankv:

Looks to me like the Holden brand would be available for Chinese manufacturers to purchase (e.g. MG, Volvo).

One wonders what the top of The Mountain will look like this year.

I can't see anyone wanting to buy that brand name. Its only known in this corner of the world and that's very small market.

I think the Chinese companies bought up plenty of brand names/companies a few years back. They are increasingly using their own names now they are becoming a major force to be reckoned with.

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Dingbatt

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#2423987 19-Feb-2020 13:09

frankv:

One wonders what the top of The Mountain will look like this year.

The cars are already built for this year. So the only difference may be Holden fans will be dressed in black, or at least wearing black armbands. I expect a few signs pointing out what people think of GM as well.

“We’ve arranged a society based on science and technology, in which nobody understands anything about science technology. Carl Sagan 1996

Scott3

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#2424006 19-Feb-2020 13:28

robjg63:

I can't see anyone wanting to buy that brand name. Its only known in this corner of the world and that's very small market.

I think the Chinese companies bought up plenty of brand names/companies a few years back. They are increasingly using their own names now they are becoming a major force to be reckoned with.

Might be worth it to great wall, given they have just purchased the Thai factory where the Holden Trailblazer & Colorado are built.

The Holden brand, and the Rights to the Trailblazer & colorado model names in this part of the world (plus the design IP) must be a worth a bit to them, and hardly anything to anybody else (making them cheap).

I think a Holden Colorado would outsell great wall branded ute's here due to brand recognition.

SIAC, which is bigger than great wall uses the previous defunct MG, LDV / Maxus brands here, could be an example for Great wall to follow.

K8Toledo

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#2424301 20-Feb-2020 05:40

jpoc:

WyleECoyoteNZ: To be honest, the writing was on the wall when Commodore was declared dead last year.

Every other vehicle in the range is a rebadged Chevrolet or GMC

I thought that the last Commodore was a rebadged Opel/Vauxhall. Indeed, I think that at the end, the entire Holden range was of that provenance. Often very similar to various GM North America products but only available here because RHD models were produced for the UK /Irish markets.

Yes quite correct, it's been that way for years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opel#World_presence

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opel_Commodore

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ShinyChrome

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#2424313 20-Feb-2020 07:58

K8Toledo:

Yes quite correct, it's been that way for years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opel#World_presence

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opel_Commodore

They may both look like ugly land whales, but only the 5th gen/ZB Commodore was a re-badged Opel Insignia, the rest (V*) were manufactured in Aus. They may be based on a common GM platform, but that's it.

First paragraph of the Commie wiki page:

The Holden Commodore is a medium to large sedan sold by Holden since 1978. It was manufactured from 1978 to 2017 in Australia and from 1979 to 1990 in New Zealand, with production in Australia ending on 20 October 2017.[2] Production of the Commodore ended in late 2019.

Above that:

Not to be confused with Opel Commodore.

Bung

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#2424315 20-Feb-2020 08:19

Holden supercars team boss ""Unfortunately, one of the issues is, an awful lot of the people that have been barracking for the Holden brand over the last 10 years or so haven't actually been buying the product," Dane said."
https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/motorsport/119651291/supercars-team-boss-fans-played-role-in-holden-demise

Or in other words other manufacturers made the cars people really wanted when it came down to real money.

maoriboy

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#2424323 20-Feb-2020 09:00

Bung: Holden supercars team boss ""Unfortunately, one of the issues is, an awful lot of the people that have been barracking for the Holden brand over the last 10 years or so haven't actually been buying the product," Dane said."
https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/motorsport/119651291/supercars-team-boss-fans-played-role-in-holden-demise

Or in other words other manufacturers made the cars people really wanted when it came down to real money.

Mainly because Holden/GM did not provide any cars that people wanted to buy (with the possibility of the Colorado and imported Arcadia), and the sales figures back this up with declining numbers each year. Holden pretty much died the moment they stopped manufacturing Commodores in Australia. Anyone who couldn't see the end was near was blindly loyal to the label.

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