Opel is firing on all cylinders it seems. An award-winning streak, including praise for its all-new Astra, the GT Concept with internet-breaking beauty, and its light commercial vehicles (LCV) have seen an increase in sales. To add to all this buzz and excitement, the automaker’s manufacturing facility in Luton has just recently produced its 750,000th Vivaro, which is quite the milestone.
“Seven hundred and fifty thousand is an impressive number for the Vivaro especially in this hard-fought market segment,” said Steffen Raschig, Opel/Vauxhall Director Commercial Vehicles. “The Combo, Vivaro and Movano are an important part of our growth strategy. We are on target to increase unit sales of these products by around 80 percent by 2022, from 83,000 light commercial vehicles sold in 2013 to 150,000 units in 2022,” he added.
The Vivaro itself has been quite a success, it’s in fact Opel’s best-selling LCV, with sales increase of 38 percent in 2015. Opel’s LCV sales in total went up by 24 percent, the highest European LCV market share since 2008. The Movano and Combo LCVs were also increasingly popular with sales up 27 and 12 percent, respectively.
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These are very good commercial vehicles. The Combi, Vivaro and Movano are very competitive in their segments.
GM should have brought these over for commercial and fleet duty in NA instead buying the NV200 from Nissan and letting the Express/Savana die on the vine.
Right now the Ford Transit Connect and Ram ProMaster series of commercial trucks are running away with the commercial segment mostly due to GM’s lack of activity and commitment.
It is my understanding that the Vivaro is a Renault design rather than GM. Renault may not have planned an NA application with the necessary NA safety requirements.
The 1st generation Renault Trafic was fully designed by Renault and built under licence at GME’s UK Luton plant as an Opel-Vauxhall Arena for Europe and as the Chevrolet Trafic (in Argentina) for the South American market.
The 2nd and 3rd generations of the Opel-Vauxhall Vivaro/Renault Trafic are the result of a 50:50 joint venture. Whilst the Gen3 styling is an evolution of Gen2, it does feature some distinct Opel-Vauxhall styling cues, such as the blade shape on the side panels.
Circa 935,000 Gen2 units were built under Opel-Vauxhall-Renault-Nissan guises. Of these, around 85% of all brands were built at GME’s Luton plant. Only the high-roof versions (for all brands) were built by Nissan at its Franco Zona plant in Barcelona.
Given the Europe-wide popularity and success of Gen2, extra plant capacity was needed for Gen3. Opel-Vauxhall versions are now built in Luton and the Renaults are built in Sandouville in France. As far as I’m aware, they are not being badged as Nissan Primastar this time around.
Opel-Vauxhalls are powered by GM’s own 1.6CDTI twin turbo diesel engines, with the Renault using its own 1.6 Energy motor.
All the body panels, interior fittings and chassis components are manufactured and stamped at Luton and shipped to Sandouville for Renault assembly. The vehicle was designed by engineers from GM in Millbrook (UK), Russelsheim (Germany) and from Renault in Villiers-Saint Frederic (France).
For info, the Gen2&3 was/is available in Canada as a 9-seater Renault Trafic minibus, so its already established in North America! GMNA has really missed the boat in not bringing GME’s van range to the Americas.
Unless I’m missing something, I think that pretty much endorses the Vivaro/Trafic as a 50:50 JV.
As usual I agree with everything you’ve said, good post, just one tiny correction – the Vauxhall Arena was fully imported and was not built at what was then the IBC plant at Luton unlike Argentina where it was built under licence by GM. As you say since the 1st gen Vivaro onwards all have been built at Vauxhalls van plant.