cam, 296 words, 0 comments, Australian Car Industry, Automotive Industry, Holden, Alpha Platform

It appears that Holden may have lost the engineering for the RWD Alpha platform. This was to be a smaller sized car than the Commodore, probably 3-Series BMW sized, which now seems to be going to GM North America as Cadillac has more control over it.

This is a blow for Holden, in my opinion, as they transitioned to an engineering company with the Zeta platform and provided a high quality and extensible platform which is used in the Commodore, Camaro and the stretched platforms such as the Buick in China.

GM has been making decisions all over the place recently; cutting this, cutting that, project so-and-so is on, project so-and-so is off, project so-and-so is on again, etc, etc. Not confidence building for an industry with high capitalization requirements and long lead in times.

Currently the moving of the Alpha engineering to North America is rumored, so maybe Holden will be able to get that business back;

In another rumored move, Global Product Board has taken development of Alpha from GM Holden and has given it to the GM North America and GM Europe operations. This was done to placate Cadillac, who does not want to compromise on Alpha's development for their planned BLS-replacement. What Cadillac hopes to achieve is to get a flexible enough platform to support 4, 6, or 8 cylinder engines, as was deemed necessary by the Wreath & Crest brand.

Holden is in a tough spot. The manufacturing numbers are too low to be sustainable for any long term - though government has been happy to throw money at Holden in Australia - and permanence will most likely be based on niche engineering ability, much like Lotus survives. Losing the Alpha platform's engineering would be a nasty loss. (reply)

cam, 152 words, 0 comments, Holden, General Motors, Apple, Automotive Engineering

When you buy something from Apple the packaging has emblazoned on it conspiciously, "Designed in California." Obviously the hardware is made in China. Holden is making the same transition: providing high value and highly profitable engineering services to its global parent company. Design is another high value area where Holden is making a mark with designs like the Torana, Efijay and now the VE Monaro Coupe.

Holden does very little manufacturing in comparison to the engineering it does such as the VE platform, the Chevrolet Camaro, and the global variants of its Commodore/Statesman vehicles. I expect a day will come when it no longer does the capital intensive and low profit manufacturing, replacing it instead with engineering and design services - much like Apple does. (more)