This is a company which lost $43.3 billion last year, and will probably lose about that much again this year. At the same time that it's begging for half of the $25 billion bailout, with Ford and Chrysler getting to split the other half, it managed to issue a statement to the Brazilian press that it's going to use $1 billion of the bailout money to introduce that country to the wonders of the Cadillac and Hummer by opening up a new factory, despite the fact that the Brazilian auto industry slumped by 20% this year, and they are bracing for a recession. Meanwhile, it's closing plants here and laying off workers. In another brilliant PR move, it announced the opening of its Russian plant. Its brilliant management didn't realize that when you're going to beg for money, it's not a great idea to travel by private corporate jet. AND, it announced that it is pinning its future on the Chevy Volt, a car that is only 10 years behind its competition in terms of technological innovation. Unfortunately, GM only plans to sell 10,000 copies of the Volt, at a probable loss of about $960 million dollars. Kind of hard to call that the future of the company. To give you an idea of just how far that GM's R & D department is behind the rest of the world: At the same time that GM is planning to begin production of the Volt, with its 40 mile range, 8 hour recharge time and 36,000 mile battery life for over $40,000 base, BYD plans to introduce a total electric with a range of nearly 300 miles, top end of 100 miles per hour, recharge time of 10 minutes, and battery life of 400,000 miles to the Chinese market for about half the price. It plans to sell 100,000 or more its first year. Warren Buffett is no fool; he bought 10% of BYD. In the meantime, while the Volt is still 2 years from production, BYD introduced its own plug-in hybrid: http://www.huliq.com/3169/73057/byd-debut-new-models-guangzhou-show Let's compare the "innovative" Volt to BYD's interim offering while it's finishing development of the total electric 2010 model: The 2009 BYD 3 hybrid, CURRENTLY IN PRODUCTION, will have a range of 100 miles vs. the Volt's 40, a battery life of 600,000 miles vs. Volt's 36,000. A charge time of 10 minutes vs. Volt's 8 hours. GM plans to have a PR victory with the Volt despite the fact that it won't be a mass production model, and they expect it to generate a total loss of nearly $1 billion. BYD plans a commercial success; it thinks it may manage to double sales on the strength of its highly profitable, mass production plug-in hybrid 3e model. http://www.huliq.com/3169/71973/byd-auto-sets-production-and-sales-plans-2009 And that's just one of the dozens of companies which are entering the developing plug-in hybrid and electric vehicle markets, which GM decided long ago were just a dead end. GM's real problems are management, or lack thereof, and research and development, or lack thereof. Unfortunately, Mr. Wagoner has managed to remain in GM's senior management since 1981, while his disastrous business decisions have contributed to the wholesale destruction of the economy since just after Reagan became president. For every bad decision, he received a promotion, until he became CEO in 2000. Despite presiding over the wholesale destruction of one of America's premiere industries, this moron has amassed a tremendous personal fortune and is the only CEO of the Big Three who is expected to actually survive this mess and keep his job. Which really says something about the depth and breadth of GM's problems. Meanwhile, GM's R & D department has managed to claim a victory in innovation when they announce that they will roll out a product just two years from now that is vastly inferior to products that are already in production and will be in showrooms next fall. That's beyond pathetic. Our car companies should be at the forefront of innovation, not several years behind China and Japan.
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