GM sets a sales target of 90,000 units

Kolkata, Jan 14 (UNI) General Motors India has set a sales target of 90,000 units in 2008 to claim a bigger market share in the country.

"We have sold 60,000 units in 2007. We plan to increase the production to 90,000 this calendar year. Our target in 2008 would be to capture 12 per cent market share in passenger car as against 9 per cent we currently have," General Motors India President and Managing Director Karl Slym today said.

The company, which is a a wholly owned subsidiary of the global automobile giant General Motors, today launched its state-of-the-art Chevrolet Captiva premium sport utility vehicle (SUV) in the city.

The company, which has brought out Spark in the mini segment, wants to keep the focus on SUV segment for now.

"We have found more opportunities in the SUV segment and so the focus on in this area. Captiva has been launched to tap this market further," Vice-President, Marketing and Sales, Ankush Arora said.

GM India is the producer of Chevrolet Optra (both petrol and diesel), Chevrolet Tavera, Chevrolet SRV, Chevrolet Spark, Chevrolet Aveo and Aveo U-VA at its plant in Halol near Baroda in Gujarat.

The Halol facility of the company was expanded to 85,000 units from the 60,000 units in April 2007 while GM India's second plant is coming up at Talegaon near Pune in Maharashtra.

"The Pune plant will have an initial annual production capacity of 140000 vehicles and will commence production by the last quarter of 2008," Mr Slym informed adding the company was investing 300 million dollar in the plant.

Mr Arora said the cost of parts of a Spark was always cheaper than a Maruti and the company was going to open more service stations all over the country.

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