Chrysler helps Great Wall Motor design A-class car

Great Wall Motor Co., Ltd. is developing an A-class car along with Chrysler.  In mid-August, Great Wall Motor General Manager Wang Fengying revealed that the company's cooperation with Chrysler was making progress. But she has not released detailed information.

Since then, Chrysler has sent dozens of technicians to assit Great Wall Motor in developing the new car model. The latter's former designs have been given up or totally changed.

The A-class car designed with the help of Chrysler is very likely to be branded with the latter's trademark, produced in Baoding City of Hebei Province, headquarters of Great Wall Motor, and sold around the globe.

Both parties will finalize the design of the new car models by the end of 2008, and then entrust domestic companies to conduct engineering designs. The A-class car is to come into the market within one or two years. Insiders guess that the cooperation between both sides is making preparations for future establishment of joint ventures.

The Chinese automaker will also entrust domestic car designers to build up other new cars, including B-class and C- class cars. Thus, Great Wall Motor's new car models will total five, plus the one jointly developed with Chrysler.

As the Chinese automaker was previously suspected of copying Fiat's car designs, Great Wall Motor is very careful so as not to commit such a wrongdoing any more. Even the design details like lamp line will be different from others, pointed out Wei Jianjun, the company's board chairman.

One of Great Wall Motor's material suppliers discloses that Chrysler applauses the Chinese party's cost control and strict management. It is reported that the company forbids its procurement staff to attend private dinner parties given by suppliers. Otherwise, they will be punished.

If Great Wall Motor forays into the sedan manufacturing field alone, it will have to face huge spending on inviting foreign designers, or risks once it chooses inferior domestic designers. The cooperation with Chrysler will naturally resolve these problems.

As to Chrysler, it not only faces crisis in the US market, but also finds it hardly to lift each foot in markets overseas, where its market share is small. Although it marched into the Chinese market at an earlier time, the cooperation with Beijing Automotive Industry Holding Co., Ltd. has generated no result. The negotiations with Chery Automobile Co., Ltd. also reached an impasse. So it will be a wise choice to choose Great Wall Motor as a new partner.