We’ll return to our regularly scheduled programming shortly, but today we have some “New Motors.” Two of the things I like presenting most here are vehicles were sold in North America for only a brief period and which are largely forgotten; and the origins of popular makes now that were once unknown. - Dacia and Skoda sold cars in Canada in the 1980s and both wanted to crack the USA, just like Hyundai. Proton of Malaysia was also looking around the same time. ARO, another Romanian manufacturer actually certified its Hunter SUV and sold ~100 of them here in a similar attempt. But U.S. sales never happened for any of them. It’s easier, historically, to start as a captive. Daewoo, Isuzu, and Suzuki first came to North America under the auspices of GM; Kia via Ford; Mitsubishi via Chrysler. - These are new cars which are not yet on sale in North America. At the moment, they are “what ifs” - but #GACMotor and #Zotye are working very hard to try to be the first Chinese brands to launch in the USA. They have a very steep hill to climb, but so did Toyota and so did Hyundai. Skodas never came to Sacramento, but the story of whether or not GACs will come to Gainesville is currently unfolding. Both were at the #NADA2019 show last week and GAC has been at several auto shows. - GAC and Zotye don’t have a long history like Skoda, but Hyundai arrived in Canada only 15 years after it was founded. GAC dates back to 1955 but really only started building volume cars in the 80s via a licensing agreement with Peugeot from 1985-1997 - it built 504s & 505s. It has a broad set of partnerships today (one with FCA) and makes three brands - Leopaard, Gonow, and Trumpchi, the last of which has a full line of cars and crossovers from large to small. - Zotye dates back to 2005 and has a controversial history of making cars that are visual copies of more mainstream products, particularly from VW/Audi. The T700 has a quasi-Range Rover look to it and underneath power comes from proven Mitsubishi Orion/Sirius engines. - So far, the only #ChineseCars to come to the U.S. have been two models from GM and two from Volvo, but Chinese makes are coming. When/if they’re old, we’ll revisit them. https://www.instagram.com/p/BtggoRflgNC/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=135c3xrp5s30u
