GM calls off plan to sell India car plant to China’s Great Wall

Jul 2, 2022

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NEW DELHI/SHANGHAI: Basic Motors (GM) mentioned on Friday it had referred to as off the sale of a shuttered Indian plant to China’s Nice Wall Motor after they did not acquire regulatory approvals, amid a harder stance by New Delhi in direction of investments from Beijing.
GM struck a deal in January 2020 to promote the plant to Nice Wall, with the Chinese language SUV-maker anticipated to pay as much as $300 million as a part of a broader plan to speculate $1 billion to determine a presence in India’s rising automobile market.
The settlement, which was prolonged twice, expired on June 30.
“We’ve got been unable to acquire the required approvals inside the time-frame of the deal,” George Svigos, govt director of communications at GM Worldwide, instructed Reuters.
“Our technique in India stays unchanged and we’ll now discover additional choices for the sale of the positioning,” he mentioned, including the corporate “hopes to realize a value that displays the worth of the asset”.
“Nice Wall Motor will maintain its consideration to the Indian market sooner or later and proceed on the lookout for new alternatives,” the Chinese language automaker mentioned in an announcement on Friday, whereas confirming the termination of the plant deal.
The Indian authorities didn’t instantly reply to emails searching for remark.
GM’s cope with Nice Wall was agreed simply months earlier than India toughened its stance in April 2020 on funding from neighbouring international locations together with China, making them the primary main casualty of the transfer that has held up billions of {dollars} of capital influx in sectors similar to cars and know-how.
This was a part of a broader crackdown by India on companies with Chinese language hyperlinks amid worsening diplomatic relations. Individually, New Delhi additionally banned greater than 300 Chinese language cell apps, together with TikTok, over safety considerations.
The transfer attracts a line below a greater than two-year effort by GM and Nice Wall, forcing the U.S. agency to restart its hunt for a purchaser whereas it continues to spend cash on sustaining some equipment and tooling within the manufacturing unit.
Requested if the plant might be used to make electrical automobiles, Svigos mentioned it was appropriate for various industrial makes use of, together with by non-automotive corporations, and GM would discover all choices.
GM, which stopped promoting automobiles in India on the finish of 2017, has already offered its different plant to SAIC Motor Corp, the place the Chinese language automaker builds automobiles below its British model, MG Motor.
This may also ship Nice Wall again to the drafting board on its plans to enter India, which it thought of an vital a part of its world technique to interrupt into new markets like Latin America, Thailand and Brazil.
Final yr, Nice Wall re-allocated to Brazil a portion of its $1-billion funding earmarked for India and reassigned a few of its workers after delays in successful authorities approvals.



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