Zhejiang Geely Holding Group has insisted it is happy with the direction of Volvo Cars despite a news agency report to the contrary.
Reuters reportedly cited sources describing the Swedish carmaker, acquired by Geely in 2010, to be torn between a desire to hang on to its roots – a focus on safety and Scandinavian understatement in car design – and a desire to turn the cars into large, flashy, high-end vehicles prized by affluent Chinese customers to compete with BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Audi.
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Reuters also said Chinese tycoon Li Shufu, founding owner and chairman of Geely and chairman of Volvo since the takeover, was growing increasingly frustrated with Volvo’s management team, many of whom are Swedish and other Europeans, according to a Volvo board member and another person close to the automaker.
“Our board and executive management are united on the strategic direction of Volvo,” Li Shufu, founding chairman of the Chinese carmaker, said in a statement cited by inautonews.com. “We are committed to delivering ambitious product plans and market growth, with my total support.”
Volvo president & CEO, Hakan Samuelsson, last week told the Automotive News World Congress in Detroit that the automaker had a ‘huge opportunity’ to use domestic facilities in China for export purposes and hailed the relationship with Zhejiang Geely as a means to lever influence within the Chinese market.
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