In North America, we know Opel in such vehicles as the Cadillac Catera, Saturn Aura, and Buick Regal. However, none of these products actually wear the Opel badge in their respective export markets. As such, it comes as a surprise that GM is looking to expand the Opel brand to international markets all over the world.
Currently, Opel is one of The General’s brands that has very little exposure outside of Europe. Earlier last year, GM tested Opel in the Chinese market by offering a limited range of Opel models, including the (old) Astra sedan and hatchback, Zafira, and Antara. The trial run moved 4,000 cars and contributed to GM’s decision to initiate a full-scale launch of Opel in China. The General hopes to position Opel as a premium European brand in the burgeoning country, joning the already-successful Buick brand.

Over the last few years, the Chinese auto market has been on a tremendous upswing, with a sizable amount of consumers attaining the ability to afford a premium vehicle. At this point, it is unclear how Opel will overlap with Buick in China and whether the two brands will offer the same vehicles with different badges (Opel Insignia and Buick Regal, Opel Astra and Buick Excelle). Needless to say, the GM Authority crew certainly hopes that GM isn’t up to its old tricks of badge engineering all over again.

In addition to China, GM is looking to bring Opel into Australia and various markets in the Asia-Pacific and South American regions. It’s currently unknown whether North America is a candidate for the European brand, but given GM’s decision to send Pontiac and Saturn to the automotive graveyard last year, we find it highly unlikely.

[Source: Left Lane News]

2011 Opel Insignia

2011 Buick Regal – GM Authority First Drive

For decades, this has been a popular bumper sticker among Chevy owners

Due to launch in October, GM will make light of the fact that – for ages – customers have put bumper stickers on their Chevys with a child urinating on the Ford logo (and vice versa).

Ewanick said the ads would use “interesting, creative and funny ways to take advantage of the fact that there’s really the Hatfields and McCoys.” He also said that the campaign will span television, print as well as online media and admitted that the theme’s inspiration was the gatherings of his own family where members would give one another a hard time about their rival truck brands.

Ewanick was the head of marketing at Hyundai Motor America for three years before coming to Nissan and staying there from March through May 2010. He arrived at GM about three months ago and has been impressing upon his new employees that the relationship between the truck owner and his/her truck brand should be used in campaigns.

Howie Long, the longtime Chevrolet spokesperson and former NFL defensive lineman, will not be in the ads. The commercials will instead feature another well-known personality.

These will be the last series of ads to be done by Campbell-Ewald, which is being replaced by Goodby, Silverstein & Partners of San Francisco as Chevy’s ad agency of record.

Even though sales of passenger cars have been on a downturn in recent years, the Detroit Three still command 81.8 percent of the pickup truck market. This is an increase of a half percent since the same period last year. Silverado sales have increased by 13 percent since July 2009 and Ford’s F-Series trucks were up 35 percent. The American car market improved by 15 percent as a whole over the first 7 months of 2010 compared to the same period of time in 2009.

[Source: Adage]

With the CAMI plant in Ingersoll, Ontario already running three shifts with maximum overtime and not quite enough time and money to add shifts to other plants, nor to consider reactivating a dormant one, there was little else to do. So, GM had to figure out a solution that held the combination of being effective, affordable and could be done in a pinch. What they came up with is pretty good.

Turns out there was enough space in the Ingersoll plant for trucks to dock in, load up a full trailer of five Terrain and Equinox bodies, and shuttle them two and a half hours away to Oshawa, where paint and final assembly will take place. This method allows for an additional capacity of 60,000-80,000 Terrain and Equinox models to be assembled and shipped off to product-thirsty Chevrolet and GMC dealers.

The General has been doing this since March, but we have to wonder whether there’s a more stable long-term solution in the works. Any takers?

View Press Release

The going rumor these days has it that GM’s next-gen compact trucks will return to their condensed roots. This means that we should expect something along the lines of a Chevy S10 (GMC S-15). These vehicles will most likely be considerably different that the present-day orado/Sierra counterparts, delivering less capability, conspicuously better gas mileage, and a starting price of roughly $15,000 (or even less).

But the ultimate question, however, is whether these new compact trucks should stick with the proven body-on-frame (BOF) design (like the present-day Colorado) or switch to a unibody architecture (like the Honda Ridgeline).

While BOF vehicles are tougher and very inexpensive to produce, the architecture may have passed its prime, especially considering tougher CAFE standards and changing consumer demands. But sharing a platform with an existing GM car or crossover (think: Chevrolet Equinox, Cruze, or Aveo – for example), would definitely result in decreased costs and greater economies of scale, but may compromise utility (ruggedness, power, and payload/towing ratings).

In fact, GM may even end up splitting the development of its compact trucks into two different vehicles: a unibody model for North America and a body-on-frame version for the rest of the world. The former would herald a completely new product while the latter would see the continuous development of the current Colorado/Canyon platform.

So, what do you think GM should do with its next-gen compact trucks? Should they remain BOF or switch to a car-based architecture? Vote in the poll below and sound off in the comments.

The 90s

In the late 90s, Cadillac’s newest model – the Catera – was being criticized left and right for not living up to standards consumers (and the automotive press) expected from Cadillac. It wasn’t enough that the Catera didn’t meet sales targets; reliability, quality, and other issues were also plaguing the rebadged Opel sedan. GM knew that something needed to be done to repair Cadillac’s sullied image. And, as if things weren’t bad enough, the brand’s market share was on the decline and its customer base was getting older: the average age of a Cadillac buyer in 2000 was 67 years old.

1997 Cadillac Catera was a rebadged Opel Omega

The Meeting That Started It All

In late late 2000/early 2001, GM executives held an informal meeting to discuss Cadillac’s future. The brand’s image, products, dealers, and service experiences were all on the table. In less than two months after the initial meeting, managers realized that what Caddy needed most was a fresh start: a fresh image, a revised product portfolio, and a younger customer. In less than six months after that, senior managers agreed on a strategy. It’s this grand plan that became known as Art & Science – and it cost GM $4.3 billion.

Art & Science

The investment paid for new, more powerful engines, a new flexible rear-wheel drive platform (Sigma) that delivered sportier handling, the edgy design that’s prevalent on every Cadillac today (except for the Escalade), and a marketing budget.

The 2003 CTS was the first Cadillac to employ the Art & Science philosophy

The first Cadillac that delivered the Art & Science theme was the 2003 Cadillac CTS. It was built on an all-new platform (Sigma) and took Cadillac in an entirely new direction. From there came the STS sedan and first-generation SRX crossover, which were also based on the new Sigma platform and transformed Cadillac from that floaty-boaty vehicle your grandpa drives to a luxury brand that could jockey with the best from Germany and Japan.

Cadillac XLR-V

And we wouldn’t do the Art & Science program justice without at least mentioning the audacious XLR hardtop convertible that was as awesome to drive as it was to look at as well as Caddy’s performance models that wear the V badge, including the CTS, STS, and XLR.

The 2004 SRX was the first-ever Cadillac crossover

Today

Fast forward nearly ten years and Cadillac – to this day – is still undergoing a noteworthy renaissance. The brand just launched the CTS Coupe, arguably the most attractive Cadillac ever made, and has seen enormous demand for the all-new Theta-based SRX. At least four game-changing models are coming over the next five years, including a compact sedan (ATS) to take on the BMW 3 series, the next-generation CTS that will go head-to-head against the 5 series, a Lambda-based Escalade, as well as a flagship sedan. Whether the latter will be the Super Epsilon-based XTS or a model based on a premium version of GM’s Zeta platform is still up in the air.

The 2011 CTS-V Coupe is the newest addition to the Cadillac lineup

But Caddy is also trimming down: it will phase out two vehicles, including the the DTS and STS sedans, at the end of 2010. The discontinuation of the DTS, in particular, may upset owners of the antiquarian sedan who have come to appreciate the couch-on-wheels personality of that vehicle. However, it appears that Cadillac is positioning itself to compete directly with the sport-luxury marques from Germany, including BMW, Mercedes-Benz, and Audi. And the new model range should assist Cadillac’s nearly non-existent presence in Europe.

The RWD Sigma-based STS will be discontinued within the year

What’s more, GM’s vice president of global vehicle engineering, Karl Stracke, vowed to make Cadillac vehicles lighter than those of BMW in unsprung mass. Seeing that BMW is often the most popular luxury brand in the United States (it swaps with Lexus for the number one spot every few months), the strategy seems solid and will surely pay off. Perhaps the “soft luxury” segment is best left for Buick, but that’s a different box of bolts (you can listen to our conversation on the GM Authority Debate podcast about Buick and Cadillac brands here).

Do you think GM’s $4.3 billion investment in Art & Science at the turn of the century was worth it? Are you satisfied with the vehicles (and results) it has produced? Talk to us in the comments below.

The DTS, which uses GM's old K platform, will be discontinued this year when full-scale production of the Chevrolet Volt begins at the Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly Plant

VTTI Smart Road

General Motors has awarded $5 million to Virginia Tech to create the National Tire Research Center at the university’s Transportation Institute (VTTI). The new facility will provide automobile and tire manufacturers a place to develop new tire technologies, reproduce emergency events, and improve vehicle highway safety.

“This facility will be the only one of its kind in the world and will generate world-class tire research data while generating significant revenue and high tech jobs in Southside Virginia,” said Tom Dingus, VTTI director and principal investigator for the tire center proposal.

General Motors hopes that the investment will lead to new tire technologies that result in increased fuel economy and lower emissions. The research center, which is an outcome of a long-standing partnership between VTTI and GM, will cost a total of $14 million, with the remaining $9 million coming from Virginia Tech and the national tobacco settlement.

“As a founding member of the National Tire Research Center, General Motors looks forward to partnering with Virginia Tech and the Commonwealth of Virginia to pioneer research and development that will develop ‘green’ tire technologies to further improve the fuel efficiency of vehicles in the future,” said Karl Stracke, GM vice president of Global Vehicle Engineering said,

View Press Release

Lear wall-mounted charging station

When the Chevrolet Volt goes on sale later this year, the chargers that will load up the EREV’s battery pack will come from Lear Corporation – a Southfield, Michigan-based automotive seat supplier. The 240-volt residential charger will be capable of filling up the Volt’s batteries to the brim with electricity in a matter of three to four hours.

The fact that Lear will be providing the chargers comes as a surprise. After all, Lear isn’t primarily an electronics firm: it earned only 20 percent of its 2009 sales from vehicle electronics.

However, Lear has been hard at work in establishing itself in the hybrid and electric vehicle components space: more than 60 percent of its 2009 patents were related to hybrid and electric vehicles. While developing the charger, the company worked closely with GM, meeting with The General’s engineers on a weekly basis over the past two years.

So, who will install the home chargers?

“We will be partnering with a provider that will go ahead and take care of our home installations on a nationwide basis,” said Gery Kissel, an engineering specialist for GM.

So far, General Motors hasn’t announced an installation partner for the home charger.

[Source: Detroit Free Press]

Lambdas

New Lambda crossovers will make their way to dealer showrooms in 2013 as 2014 model year vehicles. The Buick Enclave and GMC Acadia are rumored to be the first Lamdas to receive a redesign, with the Chevrolet Traverse to follow shortly after. They will also be the first duo of GM’s full size crossovers to be powered by the new LF3 engine.

Given that current Lambda CUVs use GM’s (excellent) high-feature (HF) 3.6 liter direct injected V6 that makes nearly 290 horsepower and 270 pounds-feet of torque, we should expect the LF3 to at least match that power output, if not beat it outright.

At this point, we simply don’t know whether GM plans to offer another engine in the Lambda-based vehicles. Many current owners of Lambda CUVs have been begging for more power and revised gearing ratios, so we could image a scenario where the base engine is the HF 3.6 and the optional up-level mill is the boosted 3.0 LF3.

SRX

The new Cadillac SRX is expected to get a midcycle refresh sometime in 2013 and – in the process – also get the LF3. Currently, Caddy’s only crossover is offered with a choice of two engines – a naturally-aspirated 3.0 liter V6 (LF1) and an optional 2.8 liter turbo V6 (LP9). The LF3 will most likely replace the 2.8 turbo to become the up-level engine.

That said, the GM Authority crew believes that despite being direct injected, the 3.0 liter LF1 is too weak (read: lethargic and unrefined) to be present in the rather heavy SRX. As such, perhaps it would be best to keep the 2.8 turbo (LP9) as the base powerplant and offer the LF3 twin turbo as the optional engine. That’s what yours truly would do… in a perfect scenario.

Impala And XTS

It’s also entirely possible for the new LF3 motor to make its way to other GM vehicles, including the next-generation Chevy Impala and forthcoming Cadillac XTS (even though the latter may end up not coming to market). Both vehicles will ride on the Super Epsilon platform, a beefed up version of GM’s global Epsilon II architecture.

The First To Use HFO

GM will be the first automaker to use HFO-1234yf, a climate-friendly refrigerant developed by DuPont and HoneyWell, replacing unfriendly chemicals used in the AC systems of most vehicles today. This means that GM’s core brands, including Chevrolet, Buick, GMC, and Cadillac, will be the first vehicles on public roads using the new solution come 2013.

CO2 Emissions

HFO-1234yf – which has a “global warming potential” of 4, replaces HFC-134a, which is what’s normally used in vehicles today. HFC-134a scores a whopping 1,400 on the same scale.

HFCs are the fastest-growing contributors to climate emissions and are classified as “super” greenhouse gasses.” Use of HFCs is estimated to grow by 140 percent before the year 2020. Compare that to a 4 percent estimated growth rate for the rest of the garbage we release into the air, it’s easy to see why this is so important.

In fact, some figures show that if we were to cut out high-impact HFCs, something that’s proposed in the Montreal Protocol, we could avoid creating up to five to eight billion tons of carbon dioxide emissions annually.

Petition In Motion

Currently, there’s a petition from the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Environmental Investigation Agency, and the Institute for Governance & Sustainable Development (IGSD) with the United States EPA that asks to remove HFC-134a from the list of approved refrigerants for use in motor vehicles.

In a press release, IGSD President Durwood Zaelke suggested that one potential barrier to rapid adoption might be the wide-spread production and commercialization of HFOs. Here’s what Mr. Zaelke said in the press release:

“The challenge is to get chemical suppliers to make this critical technology available in all countries at an affordable price. … The more enlightened position would be for the chemical companies to donate their climate-friendly and ozone-friendly technology to the public domain as compensation for the health and economic damage caused by the ozone-depleting and climate-warming gases they marketed in the past.”

Yea… right. We’ll set an infinite timer to sound off when that happens.

Nevertheless, it’s great to see The General be the first to adopt new technologies, especially when HFO-1234 has such an enormous positive effect on global pollution and CO2 levels. It will be interesting to see which automaker will be the first to follow GM in its footsteps.

For more information on HFO-1234, click here.

GM expects to finalize the purchase agreement for the plant within the next few months. The facility is used for manufacturing six-speed automatic transmissions and serves third-party car manufacturers as well as GM’s own products worldwide. The 6L50 GM’s Hydra-Matic transmission, for example, is used in the current Cadillac CTS, last-generation SRX and STS, the Chevrolet Camaro, as well as the Holden Commodore and Statesman lines. The 6L45 ransmission, also made at Strasbourg, is used by BMW in the 1 and 3 series as well as the X1 and X3.

According to GM, the plant was founded in 1967 and is a major industrial employer in the Strasbourg region, employing about 1,100 people.

View Press Release