"keeping up with the Kardashians" Katch-Up S13, Ep.3 | E!
I nipped to Shanghai last week by spending less than 48 hours in the field to attend a technical high exposure and branding for the new Qoros Sino-Israeli startup brand.
It's fascinating company and I think Qoros could become a case study in the future on how to make money from the sale of mass market cars cars The company has developed a brand new platform and a new range engines, has a shiny new factory and is about to launch a new smart Volkswagen Jetta size 3 hatchback, crossover and SUV on the way to China, the cars will be priced at 15 percent less than a Jetta with 15 percent more material worth.
Chairman Guo Qian assured me that the owners of Qoros Chinese automaker Chery and Israel Corporation investment funds spent so far just over 500 million for the established automakers, that kind of money could buy you a heavy makeover of an existing model seems impossible, it doesn t.
Well, now Qoros has a number of advantages The company was founded in 2007 with only a handful of employees Qoros then hired experienced agents in the European automotive industry to guide the engineering work that was farmed out to consultants They include Klaus Schmidt, a former boss of the BMW M division that is in charge of powertrain and suspension; Roger Malksusson formerly Saab, who led the design of the safety and design boss Gert Hildebrand, who joined Qoros directly from a decade reinventing BMW Mini.
The platform was designed to Qoros request by Magna in Austria and most of the components were purchased on the level providers tray 1 post-GM Saab technology used to develop the platform Phoenix unfortunate truth, Qoros had the advantage of using Chery engines as the basis for a major restructuring by AVL of Austria rather cheaper than buying units of an existing engine manufacturer.
The approach Qoros with its new models is to keep things simple, what makes a good car without going overboard on expensive materials and trim The family style 3 is subtle and carefully honed and date shouldn t the interior is also VW-simple, and is dominated by a large touch screen that is connected to 3G costs Qoros and is designed for use with smartphone owners the company believes that connectivity is more important for young Chinese that flash as premium aluminum bezel instruments and consoles Much work was devoted loaded buttons on refinement and ride quality, benchmarking the best European competitor models.
The new platform is designed to stretch a vehicle to a large -sized Golf car steering and an SUV with seven seats, so there should be no major expenditure of the platform in the longer term, it is also expected that a Euro NCAP five-star safety rating will be announced, which should negate any questions about the security the engine range is 1 to 6 gasoline liter naturally aspirated and turbocharged forms, but it is not diesel ago will have two manual transmissions and six-speed automatic dual-clutch hybrid drive will be offered with a rear axle power, originally developed by American axle for Saab.
Keeping small teams and do not have huge engineering facilities to maintain, Qoros kept costs very low at the end of this year, the Qoros only have 600 staff, with about 1,200 working in the new plant in Changshu the majority of the workforce at the new plant that will make 150,000 cars a year are primarily young people in their early 20s, being trained by more experienced workers from other established Chinese car factories.
Unlike many Western automakers struggling with large EMPLOYEES, pension plans and to finance large development budgets, Qoros is much, much lighter on his feet so he needs to produce the new 3 sedan, crossover and SUV models without increasing its workforce by white collar significantly, the company could see a turnover of about 1 5 billion on the production of 150,000 vehicles per year.
From scratch and agriculture on a large part of your engineering could prove to be the only way to make money on the mass market.
Simplicity is the new premium coach said Qoros, holding simple premium.
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