Former Holden sales director Peter Keley has elected retire from General Motors before the new General Motors Special Vehicles (GMSV) venture ramps up later this year.
Keley, who was first hired on at Holden as a finance trainee in 1983, will help steer the GMSV venture in the coming months and ensure a smooth transition for the newly appointed director of GMSV, Joanne Stogiannis.
GMSV will be the last bastion of GM left in Australia once the Holden brand shuts down shop later this year. The newly created sub-brand will be tasked with importing North American GM models into Australia and converting them to right-hand-drive for local consumption. The first vehicle sold under the GMSV banner will be the Chevrolet Silverado 1500 pickup truck, which is already sold in Australia under a similar arrangement with Walkinshaw Group. GMSV will also import right-hand-drive examples of the C8 Corvette Stingray. The larger Chevrolet Silverado 2500HD will also eventually be sold in the country.
Stogiannis, a 20-year veteran of GM who has held numerous roles in sales and marketing with the automaker, believes the strategy to focus on GM’s pickup line will ensure long-term success for the GMSV brand.
“Sales of large US pick-ups have been growing consistently and I believe the ongoing strength of that segment will provide a very solid basis for us to build a successful long-term business,” Stogiannis said in a statement.
According to her LinkedIn page, Stogiannis most recently served as the head of Maven Australia, though she only held this role for a little over a year before GM pulled the plug on the experimental ride-share program.
Other models that have been touted as potential GMSV products, in addition to the Corvette and Silverado, include the Chevrolet Tahoe and GMC Yukon. The new GMC Hummer EV and certain Cadillac vehicles are also said to be under consideration for GMSV.
GMSV Logo
GMSV products will be sold through a network of about 40 to 60 dealerships nationally in Australia, many of which will be converted former Holden dealerships. Look for the GMSV venture to ramp up operations as Holden’s wind down in the coming months.
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Comments
Sure this GMSV will be just as much a success as Maven, another in the long list of GMs money burning foolish ideas. Can someone name a worse run American company?
Just off the top of my head: Uber, Lyft, AT&T, The Trump Organization (And by extension, the executive branch of the US government), any American Airline, Quibi, most Banks, most Silicon Valley start-ups, etc. Need I go on?
Ford.
So what does GM do with all of the left hand driving parts and dash parts after they convert to right hand drive. Curiously interested.
Who wants to be the guy left there to turn out the lights? I’m sure that is part of his decision.
Why the hell are they not manufactured in right hand configuration from the initial project plan? These will never have the profit margins GM will demand when they have to be re-engineered and re-manufactured! Such a poor waste. GM NA management is pure crap now days!
Might be easier if Australians and the Brits began driving on the correct side of the road! LOL
We already do, we put the steering wheel on the Right side of the car, it’s you Americans who put it on the wrong side.
Pretty much all of Europe except the UK.