FRANKFURT (Reuters) – General Motors will be overtaken by Volkswagen AG this year and fall to the world’s third-largest automaker by production volume, market research company R.L. Polk Germany said today.
Global production of passenger cars and light commercial vehicles is forecast to fall 19 percent, or two million units, to 52.8 million vehicles this year – the lowest output since 1998, Polk said.
GM, surviving with the aid of U.S. loans, will suffer a 31 percent drop in production this year, Polk said. VW will likely only see a slide of some 15 percent, thanks in part to its low exposure to the U.S. auto market, where sales have dropped 38.4 percent through March.
“Volkswagen will therefore overtake … GM and advance to become the new No. 2 after Toyota,” Polk said in a statement.
Polk expects global car output to increase in 2010 again, with strong growth rates in the next two years that allow the market to achieve a record production level of more than 70 million vehicles in 2012.
Well if thats the case that probably has a little to do with it.
Porsche AG includes a lot of high end cars and although im sure those only make up a fraction of VWAG’s sales, that is a fraction that probably lost a lot less than economy cars like VW’s seeing that the rich will always have money for new cars. Or is that not how new auto sales work in economic downturns?
Not like GM has gotten that much better. Remember the Cobalt thread where we found out it’s common for them to need $2000+ steering system rebuilds? I mean come on GM, basic power steering has been around and bulletproof forever but you have to find some way to reinvent the wheel with your electric power steering and make a giant clusterfuck out of it. :roll2:
At least VW’s seem to be hit and miss with their quality problems.
entry level vw’s have stupid issues like windows falling into doors and coilpacks and wheelbearings going bad frequently. they make up for it in other ways (fun to drive, creature comforts, ect)
entry level gm’s have been complete garbage since the mid 80’s (if they got any better in the last few years i wouldn’t really know, havent had any interest. im sure a lot of people say the same thing)
you can produce all the vehicles you want, selling them is a different story.
GM isn’t selling, so they are/have been cutting back production for a couple years now right?
LOL! My buddy has an 05’ Jetta and had these 2 things happen within a week. I was riding with him and his window fell right off the track, inside his door! Then he called me a week later said the mechanics told him something was wrong and he needed a new coilpack
I find it funny that people think it was actually designed and built by GM. 80% of cars are built from supplier parts companies; such as Valeo, Nexteer Automotive, Denso. GM probably gave a company the specs that they had to follow but it was not actually designed by GM.
You can pass the buck all you want, but since everyone outsources parts and GM is the one with the constantly failing power steering system (that they won’t recall no less) it’s a GM problem.
The brake part that was failing in Toyota’s wasn’t really built by Toyota either, but that was still a Toyota problem now wasn’t it?