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Todd Hallenbeck26 Jan 2015
NEWS

Shanghai Rights

Chinese car maker Geely shapes up and readies itself to become a global brand

It is no secret that Chinese auto brands intend to export and leverage advantages such as low labour costs to compete globally.

Initial doubts about quality, poor occupant protection and amateur design are legitimate and will be overcome. For now the two terms 'made in China' and 'world class' are worlds apart.

Geely is one Chinese brand to watch and is perhaps the best positioned after purchasing Volvo Car from Ford in 2010 and acquiring Volvo Car design studios in California, Gothenburg and Barcelona as well as Volvo Car’s world-leading Safety Centre in Sweden.  

Geely is investing wisely and heavily in design and has just launched its GC9 large sedan (pictured) in China. Resemblance to the Volvo S60 is entirely intentional.

More to the point, Geely design is headed by the very talented Peter Horbury, an Englishman, whose career includes rounding the corners on Volvo’s boxy design to create the modern high shoulder and concave surfacing that defines Volvo’s contemporary design.

Before joining Geely, Horbury was based in Dearborn and carried the title of Executive Design Director, Americas for Ford where he had a hand in designing the current Taurus and most of the Lincoln product range.

So at 65 years old, Horbury finds himself responsible for Geely design, and his portfolio again includes defining the look of Volvo Car.

"When I started with Geely two years ago there were six of us in a room," he said. "Today between the studio in Gothenburg and our new studio in Shanghai we have 220 staff and will have 300 by the end of 2015."

"We’re hiring a lot of young Chinese designers and matching them with experienced designers from the US, the UK and Australia," he says smiling and quite relaxed.

Horbury selected Guy Burgoyne, whose design talent is equalled by his patience and an ability to intimidate young designers, to manage the Shanghai studio. Burgoyne recently worked at Holden Design in Melbourne and was responsible for interiors.

Between Gothenburg and Shanghai, the two design studios are working on 13 different models including development of the Geely/Volvo small car platform that will spawn compact and sub-compact sized models for Europe, US and China. In the past, Volvo Car shared its small platform with Ford/Mazda and prior to that with Mitsubishi.

As a Chinese brand, Geely is certainly thinking like a global manufacturer, although that doesn't explain its absence from this year’s North American International Auto Show.

But Geely wasn't alone in that.

Not one of China’s two dozen better known marques appeared in Detroit, despite the Chinese market claiming more than 23 million new vehicle sales in 2014 and annual growth of 6.9 percent.

China is the world’s largest new-car market and by a wide margin of several million cars over the United States. The vast majority of cars built in China are sold in China, but that situation won't last long.

Perhaps when the Chinese marques are ready to start exporting in earnest, the canary in the coalmine will be their attendance at international motor shows like Detroit's.

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Written byTodd Hallenbeck
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