GM Building Engine Plant in China - - Soure: The Car Connection

 

GM seems desperate. I can't figure out their plan thou... They leave loose ends in North American market and dive right into China.

PS: I wonder how long before we see GM-China engines in North American cars...

 

It's all about containing costs. Those engines will find their way into American assembled cars in no time.

 

Mfg. in China will save GM.
No Union to deal with = more $$ for GM.
It will put them on a more level playing field with the imports in terms of profits made per car.

 

Save GM money? $100 a month in Henan China is considered good pay. Think China manufacturing will be a force to be rekconed with worldwide eventually and not too far off.

2nd the quality will most likely remain good.

 

China's manufacturing capability is a force to reckoned with. Plus, labor is so cheap they can afford to have state of the art technology and exorbitant fixed costs and still remain competitive.

 

china is growing so fast, and it's scary. i have many friends who visited shanghai, and they all said it's a cleaner version of new york.

 

china sucks..I've been here for 2 months already (over 14 months cumulative at different projects and locations) and I'm still trying to figure out how htey're gonna keep it up.

The reason they don't respect intellectual property laws...they don't have any intellectual property to protect.

The Chinese's motto is "ALMOST good enough is good enough!"

They can't even stand in line. And don't get me started about chinese drivers. It's like a freakin' video game out there on the roads, and I'm still trying to figure out if you get more points for AVOIDING pedestrians or making them AVOID you!

China has a lot of cheap uneducated labor. The lack of educated people is such a problem that when you work for a company, you sign a contract with the company that you MUST stay with them for X number of years, otherwise you have to pay back all your pay PLUS a penalty for quitting otherwise you get blacklisted.

A problem I've seen with a lot of Chinese companies is that they have too many managers. At one site I was at, the client had an "office manager". His job was to make sure I had pens and pencils and paper in the printers and fax machines. And he wasn't any good at it either. At antoher site, every lunch I had to eat with 5 managers and they all got drunk and tried to get me to drink everyday. I asked the translator what the managers responsibilities were and he said thier work is mostly "social."

Another problem is corruption. One site I was at I was sitting around for 2 weeks because the contracting company didn't have a crane. Eventually I found out that the "manager" decided to rent the crane to another company in order to line his own pockets. It's no big deal to him since the client, not the contractor was payin 700 Euro + expenses a day for me to sit around. Inquiring further, I found that he got his job because he's a good friend of the manager above him (at their corporate office). The workers and foreman couldn't do anything because of this and jsut had to "bend over." They coudln't even quit because of their contract with the company.

And what about the story about the company that put out "bootleg" test pencils in their own market. thousands of chinese students failed their tests because the computer couldn't read the markings. They'll screw themselves for a buck.

 

I agree that it's a cleaner version of NY, but that's because it's got so many international firms there and the city makes a lot of money.

But that's just one of the few large cities that are "clean".

Other mid to large cities I've been to include Changsha, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Loudi, Tongling, LinAn, Jiande, Pingnan, and Guangzhou, not to mention the crappy little villages in the countryside.

They'll keep their "international" cities spick and span, but 90% of the country is still very "dirty".

 

China upper management not knowing what to do with their new found popularity is likely to happen for a few years, but the auto industry can't be grouped with every category of china business.

 

I agree, that when international companies come to china to build factories and equipment, the quality is a step or 2 ahead of what it would be if there were no international involvment.

But on the other hand, I did read about a company that went to china to have surgical gloves manufactured. The guy went out of business because all the glvoes manufactured were of such low quality that it allowed viruses and such to get through.

 

that's the reason i'm in china now...because our company sold equipment to a bunch of Chinese companies and it's my job to make sure they don't do a piss-poor job of assembling it.

It's kinda like babysitting.

 

that's true. how is beijing? i've always wanted to visit there. i'm sure beijing will look beautiful when the olympic comes.

 

Beijing is alright, but Shanghai is the ticket if you're more into metropolis type places.

Beijing is good for tourist stuff and to piss on the Wall if you want. It's actually pretty amazing how long it is. I haven't seen too much of the rest of Beijing, only spent a week there once for R&R, besides that just flying in and out of China through there.

On another note, when i was taking R&R in Shanghai, i was reading a local newspaper (in english), and they had the traffic section... "DEATHS from car accidents in Shanghai last week was at 46, a 20% DROP from the prior week". It's so bad there that they tally the deaths every week. I wonder what it would be if they also counted non-fatal accidents!

If that doesn't tell you how bad chinese drivers are, I don't know what would. And that's in a major city like Shanghai...it's worse out in the styx and non-major cities.