http://www.autonews.com/apps/pbcs.dl...308239953/1018


DETROIT -- The high-performance group at General Motors Co. has a broader mission again -- with a marketing veteran in charge who is eager to develop powerful small cars.

"We have a tremendous opportunity in the small and compact car market," said Jim Campbell, who was shifted last week to the new position of vice president of GM's performance vehicles and motorsports. He was moved over when GM marketing boss Joel Ewanick hired Chris Perry from Hyundai to run Chevrolet marketing.

On the eve of its trip through federal bankruptcy court last year, GM put development of high-performance small cars on ice.

GM now is considering expanding its performance line to its small cars, such as the four-cylinder Chevrolet Cruze as well as the next-generation Chevrolet Aveo. The Cruze goes on sale in the fall.

"Small cars and compact cars are going to be more and more important going forward, and we're looking at efficient performance," said Campbell, who has experience working with GM's NASCAR, American Le Mans Series and Grand-Am Road Racing teams. "We will work with those teams to provide performance variants."

Campbell said the performance division will "cross all brands" at GM but the primary emphasis will be on Chevrolet and Cadillac. While Campbell's division is not yet defined, he said he will build his own organization drawing from other GM departments.

Campbell will coordinate the performance-vehicle efforts at GM's marketing, engineering and performance parts and accessories departments.

The moves are led by North American boss Mark Reuss, who was executive director of the performance division from 2001 to 2005. It's also a reversal from the pre-bankruptcy days at GM when its High Performance Vehicles Operations unit was axed, and GM reassigned 60 engineers who had worked on special-edition, low-volume performance cars, such as V-Series vehicles for Cadillac and SS vehicles for Chevrolet, at the tech center outside Detroit.

At the time, GM said all performance projects were on "indefinite hold."

With the division strengthened, GM can look at some projects that were previously put on ice. "This is much better from an organizational perspective," Reuss wrote in an e-mail. "It's people working for a common goal under one strategic direction."

In marketing, Campbell said the aim is to improve the image of each brand.

He said: "If you come in and see a V-Series, you might not buy it, but you might consider something else" in the Cadillac showroom.

 

Great news! Give me a high performance Cruze SS 2 door...please...

 

Good. I figured this news would be coming sometime after the bankruptcy dust settled.

 

I wonder what he means by "powerful small cars". Maybe an Aveo? Not too long ago, Mark Ruess had mentioned an interest in developing an entry level FWD coupe. It will be interesting to see how these two things might converge.

In the 6th gen Camaro thread we were talking about how Camaro is moving up price-wise. I think at some point, it might be time for a sporty coupe, say in the $17-$25K range, to come in below Camaro.

 

Great news! What GM really needs is a Delta II coupe.

 

I agree, and I hope it's a uniquely styled one and not just a Cruze with 2 doors...

 

Dust off Kappa plans.
Update.
Restyle.
Slightly downsize.
Remove a bit of weight.
Strictly limit optional equipment.
Install "Monza" badging.
Undercut MX-5 prices by several thousand.

 

It's been estimated that GM lost about $10,000 on each Kappa car as it was, so I don't see any practical way to make that plan work.

 

*Shrug* Rumors. Do any of us really know?

Those cars sold for upper 20's to perhaps the mid 30's for a loaded GXP / Redline. It is difficult to believe they lost 10K per vehicle at those prices. If so, something in the plan was fundamentally flawed or someone flat lied to upper management before approval.

However, offering basically the same car through Saturn likely made the original plan less economically sound (additional parts related costs, styling / design costs, dealer support / training costs, etc). Don't repeat that mistake. Offer it as a Chevy only.

Offering two different powertrains likely drove up costs. Don't repeat that mistake. For the most part this seems to have worked pretty well for Mazda over the years.

Building the car in a VASTLY underutilized plant might have driven costs up. Don't repeat that mistake. Kappa was very similar to Corvette in some respects. Look into building it at BG.

Despite satisfactory all around performance, the car didn't sell in large enough numbers because it offered even less storage space (and therefore practicality) than a Miata. Build quality was somewhat iffy as well. Decreased sales meant each unit "cost" the company more. Don't repeat that mistake.

Furthermore, updating an existing platform (one that was pretty good actually) would surely cost less than designing one from a clean sheet, assuming of course that radical redesigns aren't required to meet current safety regs.


My signature below would absolutely look a bit different right now had they taken care of a few of these points.

 

I'd love some more performance parts for the existing Kappas.

 

Actually, I was sort of thinking about something FWD off of Delta.

 

Yeah, I know we're talking about tweaking existing models.

It's just that every time I consider what sort of fun little car could be slotted into a price range just under Camaro, I think about exactly what I wrote above.

Then I sniffle and cry myself to sleep.

For the record, I'd also like to see GM take on the WRC and give the Sti / Evo / rally car fans something to think about it. That car wouldn't exactly be entry level though.

 

I don't think we'll see a Miata type car from GM in the forseeable future. The Solstice came about thanks to a once in a lifetime alignment of planets. Plus it was more of a 7/8ths Corvette with an Ecotec rather than a true Pontiac Miata.

I'd just hope for something relatively cheap, cool and fun from GM. Something along the lines of a Chevy Mini Cooper S or VW GTi would work for me. If they could do some sporty coupe sheetmetal with it, so much the better.

 

Eric, whoever gave you that number pulled it out of their rectum because it's not based on any numbers I ever saw. It also doesn't even stand up to any business logic that even the old former General Motors would use.

Think about it a second:

The Kappa was sold by GM for $20-25K to dealers. You can sell the Volt to the board of directors on public relations, future technology, and CAFE credits even though it likley loses maybe a few thousand on it's $35K or so dealer cost. Solstice had far and away less impact and benefits. If it was going to lose 10K per car, the idea for the car wouldn't have left the laptop.

Kappa was made to break even. The reason why so much of it's assembly was labor intensive is that it was far cheaper and cost effective than springing for tooking or machinery to to those jobs. The Solstice (and Sky) would have been a financial disaster if they had been made in large volume.

The way the whole program was set up was that it would make a certain number of cars over a 3 year period, almost like Holden's Monaro was. A fixed number selling at a certain price that would cover the cost of the assembly process. In Holden's case, the Monaro was made with a lot of volume Commodore parts, so increasing production many times over and lengthening it to 5 years simply made more money. In the Solstice/Sky's situation, increasing production would have thrown things off and increased assembly price. If assembly price increased without being able to increase selling price, the cars would have lost quite a bit of money.

Solstice/Sky actually did alright.

They were made in an abandoned Saturn plant in Wilmington that GM was still paying taxes and maintence on. They cut enough out of the car, and made it simple enough to where it was a sound financial prospect. The sales of the Sky through Saturn, Vauxhall, and Opel (at a much higher price than the Solstice) helped the program. Alot of off the shelf parts and systems kept development costs miniscule.

The Kappa was also the vehicle that GM-NA experimented with a streamline process of new car development and the process of getting it to market without the normal hoops new GM vehicles had to jump through at the time (the Cobalt came shortly after and the Camaro was the latest).

Depending on who you talk to, the Kappa either broke even or lost a small amount of money but was worth it.

But that claim of losing $10,000 per car???.........

 

Autoweek reported at at the time and I saw it bandied about with some frequency though I must admit I can't find an original GM Source:

http://www.autoweek.com/article/20080902/FREE/809029955

And I'll take your word for it as I'm sure you have much better info on it than I, however I am not giving old General Motors any credit for having any business logic. C'mon. If there was something colossally stupid to do, they managed to do it.

I'm sure that the image boost that Kappa gave Pontiac and Saturn was just what they needed to...oh, nevermind.

Nonetheless, even if that figure is pie in the sky, I think moving forward GM needs to make a profitable sporty small car. Not a boutique one.

I'd like to see them do something more like the Impala/Monte Carlo with a coupe that shares the Cruze's underpinnings without being a Cruze coupe.