GM is restructuring its business in Africa and from January will split operations into to sub regions: GM North Africa, to be integrated with GM Egypt, will include activity in Libya, Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Western Sahara and Mauritania; meanwhile, activity in Sub-Saharan Africa, which will include all other countries on the continent, will be integrated with GM South Africa.
GM North Africa will be headed by GM Egypt president and managing director Rajeev Chaba, while GM Sub-Saharan Africa will include all other countries on the continent. They will be integrated with GM South Africa under the leadership of GM Africa president and managing director Edgar Lourencon (pictured).
“This re-structuring supports our plans to grow our vehicle exports, using South Africa as a base, in Sub-Saharan countries,” a GMSA spokesperson told Automotive Logistics News. “We have set up a dedicated Sub-Saharan Africa exports function which is currently analysing the opportunities to grow our business in these markets.”
Lourencon said that GM South Africa is well positioned to serve as the base from which GM can further grow its business in Sub-Saharan Africa. “As part of our growth plans, we recently announced that we will be investing R1 billion in three new vehicle assembly programmes to build the new generation Corsa Utility and Isuzu KB, as well as the new Spark. In addition to this we also recently opened our R250m new state of art Parts Distribution Centre, providing an excellent platform to better service our customers in various African countries.”
In the first 10 months of 2010, GM reports a sales rise in Africa of 15% on an annual basis to 146,000 units, giving it 12.9% of the market. GM’s two largest country markets on the continent, Egypt and South Africa, accounted for more than 70% of the company’s sales in Africa.
Chevrolet is the company’s main brand across Africa, including the Aveo small sedan, Cruze compact sedan and the new Spark.
The company recently announced that it has reached an agreement with Isuzu Motors to look at expanding the movement of its light commercial vehicles into Sub-Saharan Africa and beyond its current markets in Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi and Mauritius.
GMSA opened its parts and accessories warehouse in the Coega industrial development zone at Port Elizabeth on November 11th replacing four existing facilities in the area and shifting R300m ($43m) worth of parts inventory to the 38,000m² facility for the aftersales market.
The Coega Development Corporation funded more than R200m of the R250m GMSA facility and the carmaker will invest about R2 billion in the next two years as part of its Chevrolet Spark export programme (from its nearby Struandale plant) and upgrades to its Isuzu and Corsa lines.
Total vehicle sales for the GMSA were up by 22% last month on October 2009.
