On January 13, SAIC-GM General Manager Lu Xiao did not avoid talking about SAIC-GM's darkest moment at the 2025 New Year Media Communication Conference.
"In 2024, SAIC-GM experienced the most difficult year in its development history. Industry involution, declining joint venture share, and sluggish company sales put the entire management and company under tremendous pressure," he said.
Lu Xiao, General Manager of SAIC-GM
Data shows that in the first half of 2024, SAIC-GM's sales volume was only 225,579 vehicles, a year-on-year decline of nearly 50%.
This is the grim situation faced by Lu Xiao and Xue Haitao, deputy general manager of SAIC-GM, who took office in August 2024. In six months, they led the major "teams" to fight together, and through a series of heavy punches such as product upgrades, marketing renewal, and channel reshaping, they won the sixth consecutive increase in sales in the second half of 2024.
Lu Xiao told everyone on the spot that SAIC-GM's sales have stabilized and recovered. In December 2024, SAIC-GM's terminal sales reached 73,058 vehicles (including exports), a month-on-month increase of 9.4%, setting a record for the highest monthly sales of the year. At the same time, in the fourth quarter of 2024, profits finally returned to positive.
Xue Haitao, Vice President of SAIC-GM
Star products are the best "bullets" for SAIC-GM to launch its offensive. Xue Haitao, deputy general manager of SAIC-GM, introduced that in 2024, the cumulative sales of Buick GL8 exceeded 100,000 units, successfully defending the title of large MPV sales champion. In December 2024, the monthly sales of Buick Envision family exceeded 20,000 units; the sales of Buick LaCrosse 2025 Platinum model were 5,940 units, a month-on-month increase of 29% and a year-on-year increase of 105.5%. With the joint efforts of the new XT5 and CT5, the Cadillac brand also achieved 6 consecutive months of growth, with a 56% surge in sales in the first half of the year and a cumulative sales of nearly 130,000 units for the whole year.
Under this situation, the people at SAIC-GM, unwilling to give up unless they fight, are ready to launch a full-scale counterattack.
Lu Xiao stated on the spot that starting from 2025, SAIC-GM will comprehensively sound the "counterattack horn" of joint venture automakers, become the joint venture automaker with the fastest transformation, and become the leader in the joint venture 2.0 era.
According to him, this year, SAIC-GM will usher in a peak period of technological innovation and product launch. SAIC-GM, which owns the Pan Asia Research Center, is the "cradle" of innovative technologies among joint venture automakers. From 2025, the product definition of SAIC-GM's new models will be led by SAIC-GM and Pan Asia themselves, and will be 100% based on the needs of Chinese customers. At the same time, the digital functions of all SAIC-GM models are also 100% developed by SAIC-GM's local software and digitalization center.
In 2025, SAIC-GM will launch a new generation of super-integrated vehicle architecture built specifically for the Chinese market. Based on this architecture, the three major technical domains of Autoneng 2.0 multi-drive platform, the new generation of intelligent cockpit platform and the new generation of intelligent driving platform will usher in iterative upgrades. Among them, Autoneng will upgrade from a pure electric drive platform to a multi-drive new energy power platform, which includes a pure electric system, and will also support plug-in hybrid and a new range-extended mode. The new intelligent driving platform reserves L3 capabilities. Against the backdrop of the industry where policies and regulations are becoming increasingly clear in the future, SAIC-GM is expected to become one of the first companies to mass-produce L3 intelligent driving products. "In 2025, SAIC-GM will usher in a major breakthrough in its intelligent transformation. Our goal is to move from being an intelligent follower to the first echelon of the industry's intelligence." Lu Xiao said.
From 2025 to 2027, SAIC-GM plans to launch 12 new models, 100% of which are new energy models, taking into account pure electric, plug-in hybrid and new extended-range technologies, covering different body styles of sedans, SUVs and MPVs.
In the past year, SAIC-GM proactively adjusted its wholesale sales, destocking more than 200,000 vehicles throughout the year, and dealer profitability rebounded significantly. By the end of December 2024, SAIC-GM signed contracts with 33 mainstream auto dealer groups across the country to build 54 new dealerships in 40 cities across the country, preparing for a full-scale counterattack.
"In the new year, the industry's elimination round will be even more brutal." Lu Xiao said that SAIC-GM will face the competition head-on and go all out to promote the company's transformation and development with more innovative technologies and more high-quality new cars, bringing users a more extreme product experience.
