General Motors will fully integrate Holden engineering into the GM Advanced Vehicle Development Team with plans to hire 150 new engineers. With the hiring spree, Holden will be directly involved in GM’s future electric car and self-driving car development.
Holden announced Tuesday the 150 new engineers will be a mixture of experienced and graduate engineers and the new hires will bring the Holden design and engineering workforce to over 500 employees. The engineering hires come as Holden sheds jobs from its corporate headquarters.
Mark Reuss, GM executive vice president and president of global product, and now Cadillac, said, “The world-class vehicle engineering capability we have at Holden in Australia will play a significant role in GM delivering on its commitment to create a world with zero crashes, zero emissions and zero congestion.”
Reuss made the announcement at Holden headquarters as he toured the newly renovated Lang Lang proving grounds.
GM Holden Executive Director – Engineering Brett Vivian added, “Holden’s engineering unit has a bright future undertaking important local and global work, from ensuring imported Holden vehicles can master Australia’s unique driving conditions, to developing the technologies that will power the future of mobility globally.”
Holden will spend $120 million AUD annually on automotive research and development in Australia.
The company also said the move to integrate Holden with GM’s advanced vehicle teams further strengthens the brand’s position. Holden and Australia will also play a key role in Maven in the years to come and GM will roll out OnStar connectivity to the brand beginning in 2019.
Comments
Reuss should conduct some market research at enthusiast events, such as the recent Dream Cruise in the Detroit area, which was attended by about a million people. I think he would find that Americans in general would like to continue to enjoy the freedoms associated with owning and driving their own vehicles. And unless they can engineer electric vehicles to have the same endurance, performance and cost considerations of internal combustion vehicles, they will continue to sell poorly. Maybe Australians have a different take on this.
I respect and appreciate your point Wayne, but as someone who commutes to work into Detroit on I-75 every day, I look forward to my car managing the rush hour for me while I catch up on some sleep, read the news or get some work done. Sure on the weekend I want to drive – but rush hour commute – I hate it with a passion. Autonomous driving, coupled with vehicle to vehicle communications and vehicle to infrastructure communications will mean more cars get through an intersection on a light change, less fatal wrecks meaning less of a drain on our emergency responders, less low speed collisions, less DUIs.
Your assumption is that autonomous and driven vehicles will seamlessly co-exist on our nation’s highways. There are many questions surrounding this whole issue. Cost and infrastructure requirements would seem to be considerable. Also, our economy is centered around Americans owning and driving their personal vehicles. To relinquish the many freedoms associated with driving to facilitate rush hour commutes and improve safety is a very tough sell for me, and I think for many others.
So actually GM Holden has kept more of the technical development center than just the design studio!
The Australian customers still want Holden and HSV cars with powerfull rear-wheel drive or four-wheel drive similar to the BMW M5 or Mercedes E63 S. Front-wheel drive based on Vauxhall / OPEL but would be super. Give the customers special cars and the sales go back up and there is profit. Why is not Holden Cascada SV offered? Why not Holden Adam SV or Holden Corsa SV. Without offer no customers! Why is there no Holden with 6 cylinder Turbo Diesel Power like BMW or Mercedes? Why is the Australian police driving BMW 530d or Kia Stinger V6? Questions that are easy to answer if you evaluate the market preventively and then immediately the market with the right vehicles (CARs or SUVs) served. If you do not get anything at Holden and HSV you just go to the competitor. Frustrated customers rarely return. Think about it intensely and act.
On October 20, 2018, I will symbolically commemorate the END of the Holden and HSV production in Australia! Where? Here in Germany ala Bavaria by 93055 Regensburg.