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Recently, Opel released a message.
According to reports, insiders of Opel's parent company said that Opel is negotiating cooperation with China's Dongfeng Group and may return to the Chinese market as a domestic producer in the future. Its models will be produced in line with DPCA and will be built on the same platform.
So, how did Opel develop, and what are its origins with China? And listen to me slowly.
-1-
Unlike the original brand known as BBBAs, Opel is a genuine Ashkenazi car brand. Founded in Germany in 1863, Opel is also a brand named after the last name of the founder, whose name is Adam Opel.
(Opel founder Adam Opel)
After the establishment of Opel, it designed and manufactured sewing machines and bicycles, and began to enter the automobile manufacturing industry in 1899.
By 1914, Opel Hades was the largest car manufacturer in Germany and had built Germany's first assembly line with a length of 45 meters.
In 1928, Opel's market share in Germany exceeded 30%, reaching 37.5%. In other words, for every 10 cars sold in Germany, nearly 4 are Opel.
(Opel Green Frog Laubfrosch, introduced in 1924)
Unfortunately, due to poor management, in 1929, Opel sold 80% of its shares to General Motors, and in 1931, it sold the remaining 20% of its shares to General Motors, becoming a wholly-owned subsidiary of General Motors, focusing on the European market.
The following year, Opel became the largest car manufacturer in all of Europe. In 1940, Opel's 1 millionth car rolled off the production line, in 1971 the 10 million cars rolled off the production line; in 1983 the 20 million cars went off the production line; in 1994, 30 million cars rolled off the production line.
(1982, Corsa car production line at Opel's Saragossa plant in Spain)
However, thirty years of Hedong and thirty years of Hexi, after entering the 21st century, Opel began to lose money continuously, and it lost money for 16 consecutive years. Under such a premise, in 2017, GM sold Opel to Peugeot Citroen Group.
Interestingly, in just one year, Peugeot Citroen took Opel to turn a profit. This made Opel full of confidence, so from 2019, Opel launched a new route of global expansion, successively entering the markets of Russia, Ecuador, Colombia and other places.
In the second half of 2019, after the merger of Peugeot Citroen and Fiat Chrysler Group, Opel became a subsidiary of the new company.
-2-
What is the origin of Opel and China? In fact, from the words I mentioned earlier about returning to China, you can know that Opel has entered the Chinese market before. As early as 1993, Opel had successively launched Astra, Zafira, Meriva, Insignia, Antara and other models in China in the form of imports, which won the favor of many consumers.
However, Opel, which is based on the Buick platform, has been unsatisfactory in the domestic market. It sold 5,000 thousand in 2011, 4,500 in 2012 and 4,365 in 2013. Such a volume, compared with GM's annual sales of 3 million vehicles in China at that time, is almost negligible, and it is far behind other imported products, such as Subaru and Renault.
As a result, Opel Motors officially withdrew from the Chinese market in 2015.
The reason why Opel can't sell in China is actually not that the brand is too niche, but that GM does not want its brands to be infighting.
At that time, GM implemented the strategy of "European and American technology, global platform", which made Opel's models almost indistinguishable from those of Buick and Chevrolet, but the price was much higher. For example, the price of Opel Alt GTC is 239,000-28.9 million yuan, while the starting price of Yinglang XT on the same platform is only 129,900 yuan.
(Opel Astra GTC)
Such a high price, I ask you, how can Opel sell?
And in the Chinese market, GM is not very kind to Opel, the investment in marketing is almost zero, the sales channels are also very small, and it is only a matter of time before it is time to quit.
(Opel 4S stores that are rare in China)
It can be said that in the Chinese market, Opel is "up early and catches a late set". In 1993, the state had just begun to encourage private purchases of cars, and was in the explosive period of the market, but Opel did not gain a first-mover advantage, and later became more and more non-existent. Even after selling in China for 22 years, most people simply don't know there is such a brand. It's sad enough to think about it.
-3-
So, what is the scandal between Opel and Dongfeng this time?
In fact, it is easy to understand that Peugeot Citroen and Dongfeng have always had a cooperative relationship, and Dongfeng is still the third largest shareholder of Opel's parent company, if it is to be domestic, Dongfeng will never let it go to a second one. If Opel and Shenlong are produced side by side, they can also revitalize the idle production capacity, killing two birds with one stone.
At the beginning of 2020, Stellantis Group executives said: "In the future, Dongfeng Group will have priority over the introduction of all brands and models of the Group."
Looking at the globalization strategy of the Opel brand, for China, the world's largest automobile market and also the largest new energy vehicle market, it is obvious that it does not want to give up. Looking at it this way, the possibility of a joint venture between Dongfeng Opel is still quite large.
And if Opel can successfully produce domestically, it is likely that it will become a pure electric brand in China.
It has been reported before that Opel plans to launch the all-electric vehicle Manta E around 2025 and will return to the Chinese market with an all-electric vehicle lineup in the same year.
(Opel Manta E Concept)
It can also be seen in the previous planning that the Opel brand will reshape the brand image to become a younger and greener global brand. Starting in 2024, Opel brand models will be electrified, and by 2028, Opel will be fully electrified in Europe. In 2022, Opel will be the first to launch 9 models.
It is understood that Stellantis Group has STLA S, STLA M, STLA L and STLA F and other electric platforms, covering a wide range of models, cruising range of 500-800km, Opel, Peugeot, Citroen and other brands of electric vehicles will be based on these platforms.
For Opel's return to the Chinese market, many people are not optimistic. You know, although the Chinese car market has always been prosperous, the brother brands that share the same group as Opel - Citroën, Peugeot, Jeep, Fiat, etc., have continued to be sluggish and difficult.
In such a situation, it is really difficult to say how much Opel can turn up.
You know, Reynolds returned to the scene once that year, but the result was depressed.
(Sanjiang Renault Tafik)
Moreover, on the new track of electric vehicles, the golden sign of "Made in Germany" seems to have little effect in China.
So what do you think about Opel's return to the Chinese market?
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