GM selling Vauxhall/Opel to PSA Peugeot-Citroen

[Saturn Simon]

I heard the announcement on the news that General Motors is to sell Vauxhall/Opel, its entire European operations, to PSA Peugeot-Citroen, which is profound. GM had been rumoured to be considering selling Vauxhall/Opel for some time, as despite decent products GM's European arm hasn't turned a profit in years. However, it raises some questions...

How long will the Vauxhall brand last under PSA ownership? The cars have been just Opels with different badges for decades so the brand is pretty much meaningless now.

How long will Opel last for that matter, as what could PSA do with a brand that competes head own with its own Peugeot and Citroen products?

What will happen to the UK plants? Especially Luton? Luton makes vans.... which are basically Renaults! A factory making the products of PSA's arch rival? That can't continue for long.

Some other thoughts...
Although GM has given up on making Vauxhall/Opel profitable, its sale has left GM with virtually zero presence in Europe, especially as GM decided to withdraw Chevrolet from all European markets in 2015 (with the exception of tiny sales of Camaros and Corvettes). Perhaps Chevrolet will make an comeback as GM sees Chevrolet as its global mainstream brand. Aveos, Sparks, Cruzes, Orlandos, Captivas etc were selling fairly well in Europe and the UK by my reckoning at the time they pulled the plug. My theory is the main reason Chevrolet got pushed out of Europe was because of opposition and behind-the-scenes manipulation of the GM board by Vauxhall/Opel, as they didn't like the internal competition of Chevrolet edging into their space with increasingly more mainstream products like the Trax SUV. Chevrolet could stage a comeback with the decent products it has now like the new Cruze, Malibu, and Bolt EV.

This is the sad end of a very long era. Opel has been part of GM since 1931 - 86 years, and Vauxhall since 1925 - 92 years!

 

[AmericanThunder]

Also remember that GM's presence in Australia ends this year with the closure of all Holden manufacturing.
GM was one of the auto makers that received a bail-out from the US government, so I can't decide if that they have still been making financial mistakes or if the reduction to North America only was perhaps part of the deal?

 

[Saturn Simon]

GM as a whole has been making good profits in recent years, and seems to be recovering well.

This could be just the next wave of GM's re-structuring to become a smaller, leaner more profitable business with fewer factories. The first wave of course happened in 2010 (following the government bail-out, I think) with the loss of Pontiac, Saturn, Hummer, and Saab. In some ways I can see that GM would want to get rid of any part of the business that wasn't profitable, but Europe seems too big a market to turn its back on entirely.

The Holden brand is continuing in Australia, I believe, but only with imported cars.... Incidentally the next Holden Commodore was going to be closely based on the Insignia. I wonder how that will work now that Vauxhall/Opel is no longer going to be part of GM? Also some of Buick's current range is borrowed from Opel.

 

[AmericanThunder]

Pontiac closed it's doors in 2008.
The thing with profits is that its entirely dependent on which spreadsheet column you want to show!!