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riviera74

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Everything posted by riviera74

  1. riviera74
    Well, if somebody at GM wanted to build a direct Jeep competitor as GMC product, I'm in. I wish Sergio would give Ghosn a call and let them talk merger. The only reason Sergio keeps talking FCA-GM merger is that GM foolishly failed to buy Fiat back in 2005 and had to pay an exorbitant exit fee of $4 billion. Tell Sergio to just go.
  2. riviera74
    Better to ditch Europe than be a global player when the European auto market implodes. As for Regency's points: Do we miss Pontiac? Sure. GM does not simply for profit reasons. The SS should have been the new Bonneville, but GM wasted Pontiac after 1985 or so. Cadillac could use a better and larger CUV lineup and the CT8 to come out NOW rather than in the next three years. As for developing Buicks and Holdens, let China do the heavy lifting since China is buying anything with a Buick logo on it. Lastly, ditching a LOT of European pension obligations is a GOOD thing. The GM empire needs to shrink so that GM can actually survive if not thrive past 2030.
  3. riviera74
    That's exactly right. Details matter!
  4. riviera74
    It may require a serious auto recession to really clear out dead names and shutter factories in a way that the last recession did not, at least outside the USA. Ghosn did save Nissan from becoming Plymouth, but who will save Nissan/Renault/Mitsubishi from going the way of Studebaker in 1963? I doubt we will have half of these car brands around in the next 8-10 years. The only question is who will be RIP.
  5. riviera74
    What cmicasa said.
  6. riviera74
    You know, this leads me to a suggestion. If GMC can dress up a bunch of trucks that have a little distinction from Chevy trucks and call them Denali, why can't Cadillac? Think about this: a typical Denali adds about $5000 to the price of a typical GMC model with SLT-2 trim, right? And since Denali is at least 75-80% pure profit, then why doesn't Cadillac have its own Platinum trim for its cars and CUVs? And the Escalade should be the starting point for this new trim, even more so than it is now.
  7. riviera74
    I understand why Europe and China prefer a turbocharged smaller engine (i.e. engine displacement taxes). But why should Cadillac settle for that here in the USA? Turbos mean one thing that GM had mostly been moving away from since 2000: Premium Fuel. Have you seen premium vs regular fuel prices? The price gaps are anywhere from 45-60 cents in some places. And while turbos solve the torque problem somewhat, mileage becomes an issue too. Maybe the real problem is that the LFX 3.6L V6 has worse torque than the 3800 and 3900 V6 engines from the last decade. HP is great but every CUV like every car needs torque. Otherwise, the review is spot on. Keep up the good work. The CUE issues remind me of all the issues BMW had with its infotainment system on its flagship 7 series back in 2002. Bavaria needed at least two or three years to resolve those issues. Why can't Cadillac simply contact JVC or Kenwood and let them do the infotainment instead of CUE?
  8. riviera74
    Alliance, huh? Why not a real merger between those three brands instead?
  9. riviera74
    QFT Balthazar. Especially about the Camaro.
  10. riviera74
    I do not know if this is true, but there is nothing that says that GM cannot bring the SS back in a year or two. Ideally there will be a new-bodied SS and a SS-based Cadillac CT8 along with it for all to see and buy sometime soon.
  11. riviera74
    Maybe GM wants a better diesel engine for the cars. You could get away with a different type of engine in trucks. Or perhaps Cadillac does not want a diesel engine in their cars.
  12. riviera74
    Actually, I would rather have Buick keep the curvy look. It makes the Enclave look less like the Traverse and Acadia. The Enclave also need to have more features and amenities to distinguish from Chevy and GMC, and possibly build a basis for a Cadillac XT7.
  13. riviera74
    A billion in cash and a billion in assumed liabilities..... for Opel/Vauxhall. Why should GM assume a billion in liabilities? I still remember when GM was stupid enough to negotiate a deal to buy FIAT and then get taken to the cleaners for $4 billion as an exit fee. THAT greenmail saved FIAT and allowed Sergio to acquire Chrysler. Better to leave the liabilities AND the boat anchor squarely in PSA's hands. Europe's auto market is heading south and it needs to be culled. Capacity needs to disappear and somebody may need to go out of business. Remember the nearly 1000 dealers that went out of business in 2008-10 in the wake of the Great Recession here in the USA, along with a bunch of factory closures since Oldsmobile was killed in 2004? Europe needs exactly the same thing simply because the sales are simply not there. Better that PSA deal with this than GM, simply because Paris and Berlin will have to deal with economic reality very soon.
  14. riviera74
    Back to Opel, would an EV run in Detroit or Minneapolis (or most of Canada) in the middle of a harsh winter? Or in Europe, deep in northern Scandinavia? If not, the EV will be almost strictly a Sunbelt vehicle.
  15. riviera74
    Smk4565, that vehicle looks a LOT like the Chevy Avalanche/Cadillac Escalade ESV that used to be on sale a couple of years back, but was cancelled because of poor sales. Mercedes is not the only one who can go over the top if the ideas are valid.
  16. riviera74
    In general, right to work can be better in most cases. Especially where such labor is easily found and/or replaceable. Our UAW and CAW have not truly accepted that concept just yet, and neither have unions in our public sector. By domestic standards, German unions are among the strongest and most stubborn worldwide. If Germany is not careful, they may not have much to export other than manufacturing prowess to the USA and elsewhere ---- along with the factories that will leave the Old World too.
  17. riviera74
    Can we at least wait for the XT3 to be released? It is true the Cadillac looks like it is behind because of current sales trends, but budgets, time constraints and limited resources all take their toll. Without the Escalade, Caddy would have a Lincoln-sized funding gap problem. It wan not that long ago that Caddy was simply not competitive in the luxury space and a lot of bad decisions led to inferior product. The Germans and Lexus have made so few mistakes in the last 25 years or so that Cadillac looked really bad. As far as I can tell, Cadillac has largely escaped its worst days and will be fully competitive within five years or so. The XT5 (and CT6) are proof of that. The XT3 will be more proof once released. You could say that the best thing about Cadillac is Chevy, since unlike Mercedes Caddy does not have to appease the non-luxury market anywhere. Cadillac is going in the right direction and it will be just fine in 2020 or so. No need to panic.
  18. riviera74
    Damage control is nice. But, as always, there will be factory closures and lost jobs in Europe for one simple reason: the sales are not there. Sooner or later (my over/under is three years), the European auto market will really shrink because the sales are not there and there has been excess capacity for YEARS. The only problem is that no auto company (GM, PSA, VW, FCA, Ford etc.) want to be first to shutter a factory, whether it is the UK or France or especially Germany. Economically speaking, much of Western Europe has not fully healed from the Great Recession and the Euro is a straitjacket. Somebody has to just say: we are done supporting this economic farce and we are done. Too bad Europe makes it really hard to close failing businesses since that is what they need, just because their citizens fear losing a lot of jobs.
  19. riviera74
    A major difference in the US corporate environment and Europe's corporate environment is bankruptcy law. Here you can reset (see GM in 2009 and its use of Section 363); in Europe bankruptcy tends to mean liquidation and a whole LOT of lawsuits since BK is about revenge not just money. If it is as bad as hyperv6 says it is for the people of Europe to think this way (i.e. excessive socialism AND a ridiculous sense of entitlement from corporate Europe), then much of corporate Europe should move a whole lot of their operations (not just a few factories) to the USA to save a whole lot of bother. I doubt they will (unless Congress and the current administration end corporate taxation). If I were running a European multinational, I would certainly consider a move to the USA as a lower-cost, less-regulated place to do any and all business and let the Old World deal with the consequences of no jobs and a very nasty recession to go along with the BK of their socialism and their governments.
  20. riviera74
    Drew, why should GM BUY PSA? The auto market in Europe has too many brands and too much capacity given low and falling sales. GM has been leaving unprofitable markets ever since Mary Barra has been CEO, which is a good thing. The European market will be in an auto recession before we are here in the USA. Even though a lot of R&D is in Europe, that is NOT where the $$$ is. If and only if auto capacity were cut in half, the auto market would begin to fully recover from the the last eight or nine years. Opel may have its place, but shuttering planes in Germany is extremely difficult, especially compared to the USA. Better to let PSA and VW fight over a shrinking market than play (and lose $$) in this space. As for killing Pontiac and Oldsmobile, the problem was that there were simply too many brands given a US market share of less than 30%. If it was 1990 or earlier, both could be kept because they added to the bottom line. I miss Olds but I have accepted that GM survival was more important, especially when GM ended Pontiac and Saab and Saturn and Hummer. GM could not be what it was 25 years ago because of the Japanese and the Korean automakers period. Same with MB, BMW and VW. CEO Barra understands something we all should be cognizant of: smaller and more profitable (and higher free cash flow) is better. No need to be huge and lumber towards a possible liquidation. Remember what happened to Chrysler after 1998, and the current fate of FCA points to a long-term end.
  21. riviera74
    The internet can do a lot of things, but it cannot abolish agency laws that protect dealer monopolies. Bypassing those is harder than it looks.
  22. riviera74
    How will China NOT survive a trade war (or zero access) to the US market? This is NOT 1979. China is in better shape than anytime in the last two or three centuries. They may have a problem or three but I am sure they can survive without trading with the USA just fine. They did just that for centuries. The problem with trade wars is that they tend to beget real wars, as in mobilized armies preparing to invade other countries. Our war against Japan (in the 1940s) started with an embargo against selling oil to Japan back in the 1930s, admittedly to protest their militarism in the western Pacific and much of East Asia. Trump seems to think that this is a game. He may be grossly underestimating their resolve---and overestimating our ability to withstand such massive unnecessary economic pain to make a point against one of our largest trading partners. Running trade policy as if we are trying to restore Detroit to 1950s greatness is a fool's errand. Such blatant protectionism is wrongheaded on its face and very misdirected. Instead, we should be wedging China's borders open to MORE American goods and services, not cut ourselves off completely.
  23. riviera74
    How many cars in Europe even have v6 engines in them?
  24. riviera74
    Two questions: do GM cars use Apple or Android for their maps? If not, then how can anyone best avoid a NAV system without sacrificing features and amenities in a GM vehicle?
  25. riviera74
    Amen Dfelt. Maybe GM should mandate the Saturn (dealer) model across all current GM vehicles. It sure would raise customer satisfaction.
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