HYRA CELEBRATES AS GEELY MAKES PROGRESS WITH VOLVO CARS
On August 2nd, 2010 in London, Ford officially delivered 100 per cent of Volvo Cars assets to GEELY Holding Group, indicating Geely's successful acquisition of Volvo Cars. Thus, the auto maker becomes the very first multinational automaker in China. In the past year, through rational planning and effective management, Geely not only made great strides itself but also helped Volvo Cars turn loss into gain.
Reacting to the development, Seyi Oyinlola, Managing Director of Hyra Motors, the company that markets Geely in Nigeria, remarked that it is a vindication of his position over the years that Geely is a not just a Chinese car maker, but also a player in the global auto industry whose products are respected internationally because of their quality.
In several months following the acquisition, it had been a general concern that Geely might suffer from organizational deficiencies. However, Geely soon proved that the acquisition was a smart move. First, even after the acquisition, Geely still allowed Volvo Cars employees to manage Volvo Cars. With this management style, Volvo Cars employees are fully responsible for managing and operating their own brand and products. Second, Geely also helped Volvo Cars build its own board of directors and senior management team which consists of financial, R & D, manufacturing and logistics elites.
The established 'Volvo-Geely Cooperation and Collaboration Committee' encourages extensive communication between Volvo Cars and Geely in fields including production, purchasing, R & D, marketing and sales, and employee training. Additionally, in the next five years, Gely plans to invest a total of 10.5 billion U.S. dollars on Volvo Cars. It is this series of effective decisions and actions that enabled Volvo Cars soon to thrive financially again despite the European economic slump.
While turning Volvo Cars again into a profitable brand, Geely, an automaker itself, also demonstrates a great potential for future development. For the first half of the calendar year of 2011, Geely has sold a total of 215,451 units. It is 7.21 per cent increase compared with the sales in the same period of last year and twice as much as the overall sales growth of the auto industry. Many main products of Geely (including EC7, LC, SC7, etc) have been launched in every regional market, and their sales are all on a steady increase.
The great popularity of Geely vehicles is inseparable from the company's sustained and consistent investment on R & D. Currently, Geely has an R & D team of over 2,000 members and has established five technical platforms, 15 product platforms, and platform frameworks for 42 models, which all greatly enhance its R & D efficiency. To further improve safety and security of its vehicles, Geely's collision laboratory is being constructed in full swing.
Upon completion, the lab will be able to conduct about 200 collision tests for every model of Geely vehicles before being launched into the market. Additionally, Geely has made many significant advances in important auto parts. All Geely vehicles will carry the six-speed MT/AT transmissions which are independently designed and developed by Geely. 1.3T turbo-charged engines will also go into production next year. Geely attributes its great success in automobile market to its strong R & D team, and a strong R & D team will always be an essential part of Geely's long-term strategic plan.
In addition to sales and R & D, Geely has also made great progress in providing quality service to its customers. Geely has been continuously increasing its investment on logistics and is now planning to build several regional logistics centers for auto parts. With these centers, 70 per cent to 80 per cent of auto parts can be delivered to stores within 24 hours, and 90 per cent can be delivered within three days. As for the global market, Geely announced early this month that it will establish its first overseas training centre in Chile to strengthen its single-store sales and service quality in Central and South America,. Besides, in Ukraine, Geely's telephone service center has been operated successfully for two consecutive years and has effectively ensured the quality of service available to the local customers.
'The acquisition of Volvo Cars allows for collaboration and cooperation between an eastern enterprise and a western enterprise, and it also effectively links the market in the East with that in the West', says Mr. Li Shufu, Chairman of Geely, in an interview. Evidently, the two famous automakers have successfully integrated their organizational, marketing and cultural resources, given full play to their respective advantages in sales, R & D and services, and have laid a solid foundation for their future growth and development in the ever-changing automobile market
According to Oyinlola, this calls for celebration, because Geely has, once again, shown that it is an auto maker of repute, both for the quality of its products and its competences with regards to management, marketing strategies and R & D.,