GM aims for 12 pct Euro market share -papers
BRUSSELS, Feb 4 (Reuters) - Carmaker General Motors Corp
aims to increase its 1999 market share in Europe to 12 percent
from 10.6 percent, GM's Europe president was quoted on Thursday
as saying.
"We hope to rise to 12 percent," Michael Burns told Belgian
newspapers.
He said GM was counting on its niche models and the new
Astra model which competes with Volkswagen's Golf.
"The Astra represents 35 to 40 percent of the total sales
volume of (GM's German subsidiary, Adam Opel AG)," he was quoted
as saying. "It even overtook the Golf in the last quarter of
1998."
Burns added he was not really worried by the
recently-announced acquisition of Swedish carmaker Volvo
by GM's U.S. rival Ford .
"Via our 50 percent in Saab, we are active in the same
segment as Volvo and on the same markets," Burns said. "It is
because of the lack of this complementarity that we were not
interested in Volvo."
Asked by La Libre Belgique which other carmakers might be of
interest to GM, Burns said: "In a speculative way, I'd mention
the BMW group . They operate in the same superior luxury
segment in which we are weaker.
"(BMW) would be the ideal partner, allowing us to increase
our presence on the market just above Saab's," he said.
Burns added in L'Echo newspaper that GM aimed to study in
the next two years "the issue of an increase of our stake in
Saab."
((Bert Lauwers, Brussels newsroom +32 2 287 6815, fax +32 2 230
7710, bert.lauwers@reuters.com))
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