According to the information disclosed by the National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System, GAC Motor Co., Ltd. has undergone industrial and commercial changes, and the enterprise name has been changed to GAC Trumpchi Automobile Co., Ltd. The data shows that GAC Trumpchi Automobile Co., Ltd. was established in July 2008, renamed from “Guangzhou Automobile Group Passenger Vehicle Co., Ltd.” and “GAC Motor Co., Ltd.”. The legal representative is Feng Xingya, the registered capital is about 16 billion RMB, and it is wholly-owned by Guangzhou Automobile Group Co., Ltd.
Counting several major domestic auto groups, including FAW, SAIC, Dongfeng, Changan, and GAC, each one shoulders the important task of developing the national auto industry. Therefore, each auto group has made efforts in its own brand, and almost every auto group has multiple own brands under it.
In the big independent brand strategy once formulated by GAC, it includes four sections: GAC Trumpchi, GAC Changfeng, GAC Zhongxing, and GAC Giao. However, only the Trumpchi brand has developed rapidly upward.
GAC Trumpchi was launched at the 2010 Beijing Auto Show. At that time, Trumpchi was just one of GAC Motor’s rich own brands. In addition to Trumpchi, there are also two major brands, GAC Zhongxing and GAC Giao. In 2014, after GAC Group proposed the “big independent brand” strategy, it unified manufacturing, supporting, and sales of the three independent brand sections of GAC Trumpchi, GAC Giao, and GAC Zhongxing, and set the goal of achieving one million production and sales in 2020. However, after tossing and turning for several years, only the Trumpchi own brand developed rapidly upward, while Giao and Zhongxing stopped advancing and finally stopped production and sales.
In 2016, GAC Group issued an announcement agreeing that its subsidiary Guangzhou Automobile Group Passenger Vehicle Company would acquire 49% of the equity of GAC Giao Automobile Co., Ltd. and carry out subsequent production transformation and construction projects, and transform the production base of GAC Giao into the production of Trumpchi models. In 2019, Guangzhou Automobile Group Passenger Vehicle Company was renamed GAC Motor Co., Ltd. In fact, as early as September 2017, the market had once rumored that GAC Motor would be renamed GAC Trumpchi, but it had not been implemented for a long time.
Renaming is the only way to develop own brands. In the development concept of GAC Group, “using the entire group’s strength to develop own brands” has always been the principle of GAC Group. And changing the name of GAC Motor Company to GAC Trumpchi will also further highlight the important position of the own brand in GAC Group, thereby enhancing the corporate image and popularity of the brand.
According to the official website, the current GAC Trumpchi models on sale include the sedan Shadow Leopard, SUV GS4, GS3 Shadow Speed, GS8, Shadow Cool, MPV M8, and M6. Currently, GAC Trumpchi is undertaking the technological transformation of plug-in hybrid models. In the first half of the year, GAC Trumpchi’s cumulative sales volume was 188,900 units, an increase of 0.44% year-on-year, and it was the only brand in the group that achieved growth. Among them, the sales volume in June was 32,800 units, a decrease of 20.29% year-on-year.
GAC Group Chairman Zeng Qinghong said that in 2024, GAC Group will strive to achieve the goal of a 10% increase in sales volume and strive to achieve more than one million sales volume of own brands. At present, the sales volumes of the joint venture sections of Toyota and Honda have both declined, and the performance of Aion is also average. Only Trumpchi has achieved growth. Whether GAC Group can successfully complete the goal.
