Looks like the bad phase for General Motors has passed away. It has been reported that the company will resume the production of the diesel variants of its Sail Notchback and hatchback by the end of July. Tavera BS III will also resume production in the next month. The production of these 2 vehicles has been at halt since more than a month now, which has affected the GM sales in India drastically.
General Motors is one of the largest automobile manufacturing companies in the world. It was started in the year 1908 and has completed 104 years of highly successful existence. From 1931 to 2007 (77 years), it remained the number one manufacturer in the world consecutively. It serves in more than 157 countries. Chevrolet is the most renowned among the GM marques.
This marque at times is used synonymously with GM. Sail is a supermini car manufactured by GM (China) and is distributed all over the world under the brand name, Chevrolet. In India, Chevrolet Sail was launched last year in November. Both the petrol and diesel variants were made available.
It was reported last month that GM has noticed a quality issue with the diesel variant of Sail hatchback. An emission issue was also cited in Tavera BS III diesel variant. Due to this, production of Sail was stopped on the 5th of June while Tavera was brought to a halt on 6th of June. GM had clearly stated that the production has been ceased due to quality issues and not due to any safety considerations. They also said that the petrol variants of Sail and Tavera BS IV were not affected. The company voluntarily stopped the production and recalled the product from the market.
The production has been at a halt for more than a month now. The company sales have been badly affected by this. In June 2013, it sold a total of 6,675 units only which is down by 10.71%. Sail sedan had sold only 998 units while Sail U-VA sold only 509 units. In the entire month of June, no Tavera was sold out. Sail and Tavera are both among the company’s best sellers in India with maximum sales coming from their diesel variants. With their production at halt, the company’s overall sales were hit badly.
Now with the problem sorted out, GM is soon going to resume the production of both the models. Vice president of General Motors India, Mr. P. Balendran said that “We will start production of Sail HB (hatchback) & NB (notchback) diesels by end of July and Tavera by end of August”.