A few days ago, General Motors announced that it would take decisive actions to transform itself on the basis of the comprehensive strategy formulated in 20 15, so as to focus on its core business, promote significant cost-effectiveness and increase shareholders' income.

In the announcement, GM announced that it would gradually stop its sales, design and engineering business in Australia and New Zealand, and eliminate the Horton brand before 202 1.

Like Britain, Australia and New Zealand are right-hand drive car markets. General Motors President Mark Reius (Mark? Reuss) said in a statement that with the sales of GM's Australian Horton brand plummeting, it is no longer possible to prove the rationality of continuing to invest in the production of right-hand drive vehicles.

"In order to continue to operate Horton, GM explored various possibilities. However, there is no investment that can support the highly dispersed market of right-hand drive vehicles, no funds to support brand growth, and no investment that can bring appropriate returns. "

Today, Horton's market share has dropped to 4%. Such data can no longer support its long-distance production across the hemisphere, and factories in Thailand will face the fate of "abandonment" because of low utilization rate.

In the Thai market, GM's evacuation plan is obviously faster.

On February 17, Great Wall Motor announced the acquisition of GM's manufacturing plant in Rayong, Thailand. The two parties plan to complete the transaction and final handover before the end of 2020. GM's Chevrolet brand will withdraw from Thailand's domestic market before the end of 2020. This is also after the sale of the Indian factory, GM further withdrew from the Southeast Asian market.

In fact, GM chose to abandon the markets of Australia, New Zealand and Thailand first because its local business scale is not large.

"We will reduce our business scale in these three countries and sell niche special vehicles instead." According to GM, similar actions will be taken in Japan, Russia and Europe.

According to Lv Fei Auto's understanding, the above actions are expected to generate a cost of US$ 65,438+065,438+0 billion, including a net cash expenditure of about US$ 300 million. For the corresponding regions, about 828 people in Australia and New Zealand will face unemployment, while Thailand will lose 1 1,500 jobs.

"These are difficult decisions, but for GM's international business, they are necessary to achieve growth and profitability goals." ? Steve Keefer, Senior Vice President of General Motors and President of General Motors International (Steve? Kiefer) said.

According to GM's latest financial report, in 20 19, GM's international business lost $202 million, including $654.38+200 million in the fourth quarter, further expanding than the same period last year.

According to the data of Lv Fei Automobile, in 20 19, GM * * * sold 7.74 million vehicles, down 10.7% year-on-year, far exceeding the 5.9% decline of Volkswagen Group 1% and Renault Nissan Alliance, not to mention the Toyota Group, which rose 2.2% year-on-year. Among them, the decline rate of China market is as high as 15% to 3.09 million vehicles. And 20 19 is the second year of continuous decline in GM's sales in China.

Gm, which urgently needs to stop bleeding, has to simplify its global business to tide over the difficulties.

In recent years, GM's financial performance has been "optimized" by "slimming" its international business.

On February 5, General Motors Chief Financial Officer Divya Suadvara (Divya? Suryadevara) said that compared with 20 18, restructuring GM's international business outside China to make its profit margin reach middle single digits "really means an improvement of $2 billion".

In fact, GM's "Great Retreat" also originated from another GM plan.

Mary, Chairman and CEO of General Motors? Barra (Mary? Barra) said in a statement that GM is focusing on markets with correct strategies and strong returns, and will give priority to those investments that can promote the future travel development of the global market, especially in the fields of electric vehicles and autonomous driving.

With the continuous decline of the current automobile industry, GM has felt increasingly fierce competition. For this reason, the company hopes to speed up the electrification strategy and make a good electrification layout in advance in order to catch up with competitor Tesla.

At present, GM has spent billions of dollars with Cruise? LLC jointly develops self-driving cars.

According to danammann, CEO of Cruise, the market for self-driving cars is estimated to be $8 trillion, covering self-driving taxi services, self-driving freight services, data analysis and in-vehicle experience.

In terms of electrification, GM plans to invest $8 billion to launch 20 new pure electric vehicles around the world by 2023. A few days ago, GM also announced that it would rename the Hummer brand as a pure electric "super pickup" with great horsepower, acceleration and torque, pointing directly at Tesla cybertruck electric pickup. The model is expected to be put into production in a factory in Detroit in the autumn of 20021and sold before the end of the year.

This article comes from car home, the author of the car manufacturer, and does not represent car home's position.