Plans for a production alliance between General Motors’ European unit Opel and PSA Peugeot Citroen are already more advanced – and more detailed – than the companies admit publicly, a German newspaper said at the weekend.
The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) said it had seen a GM internal planning document outlining future model planning, production and assembly site proposals for both Chevrolet and Opel out to 2020 which includes possible development and production of shared Opel Insignia/Citroen DS5 notchback sedan (from February 2015) and wagon (later) variants – which would replaced the current generation Insignia on a shared platform. These would all be built at Opel’s Russelsheim plant near Frankfurt from 2015.
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Production of the D-segment Peugeot 508 – which shares its platfrom with the Citroen C5 – a different platform to the DS5 which shares its with the DS4 – would also be moved to main GM Europe plant near Frankfurt from 2016.
A Peugeot spokesman in Paris told the paper negotiations were ongoing and could take to the end of the year.
But an Opel spokesman said the suggestions were speculation despite an IG Metall union executive, Armin Schild, telling FAZ earlier that such a scenario was currently being negotiated seriously with the French.
FAZ noted PSA has caused uproar in France with its recent announcement of up to 8,000 job cuts, including closing the small car plant at Aulnay, near Paris, provoking political intervention.
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By GlobalDataFAZ said GM vice chairman Stephen Girsky, also chairman of Opel, has been the lead in negotiations with the PSA group, headed by strategy chief Jean-Christophe Quemard.
Both sides want to avoid premature disclosure which could derail plans for such important cost reduction projects, FAZ added.
Shifting the DS5 and its planned additional variant plus the 508 to Germany would affect French PSA factories in Rennes, Brittany and Peugeot’s main plant in Sochaux, FAZ said.
Establishing a production-sharing deal with Opel, as the internal GM documents outline, would mean further job cuts in France – the 508 accounts for two-thirds of Sochaux production.
The paper said the additional production volume from the DS5/508 shift to Germany and the additional sedan and wagon versions shared with GM would tally about 140,000 units, according to the CAR-Institute of the University of Duisburg, allowing a three-shift operation at Russelsheim which presently does 140,000 Opel/Vauxhall Insignias a year on a two-shift, four days a week basis.
Production of the Astra in Rüsselsheim will end with this generation and, as GM announced earlier, will be shifted to lower-labour cost England and Poland.
“The two French models today are based on different platforms but for the future, we can certainly create a common platform that [could underpin] even the Insignia,” said industry expert Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer of CAR-Institute.
There would savings in development costs for a platform for three vehicles and Rüsselsheim could be expanded to build up to 320,000 vehicles a year at no additional cost.
The document also discussed possible expansion in Russia from 2018, either a strong expansion of existing production capacity or the building of a new factory in addition to the existing GM plant in St. Petersburg.
Bochum, the Zafira-building plant with no official GM production plans beyond the end of 2013, could also get a reprieve: suggested, but apparently still being negotiated, is to move Opel/Vauxhall/Chevrolet Mokka production for Europe there from GM Korea.
GM is also apparently considering a completely new model segment called ‘country tourer’ based on the Insignia and also built – presumably on the shared platform – in Rüsselsheim.
Also up for discussion is the future of Opel’s Eisenach site.
How it all turns out will depend on negotiations with Opel works council and trade unions in ongoing negotiations over wage cuts, job cuts and possible site closures, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung said.
PSA, which lost EUR819m (US$1bn) in the first half of this year, announced in July that it intends to cut 8,000 jobs (the Aulnay axe is part of that) while GM Europe booked a $656m first half loss.
Opel chief executive Karl-Friedrich Stracke, who quit last month, told Bochum workers in May no decision had been made on their plant’s future beyond 2014.
