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General Motors' struggling European unit Opel has emerged from its worst-ever sales crisis in Germany and now expects to gradually expand its slice of the market back into the double digits, a level not seen since 2005.
"Upcoming models will allow us to occupy segments where Opel so far has not been present. We will then have the necessary products in the showrooms to crack the 10 percent market share ceiling in the mid to long-term," Germany sales chief Imelda Labbe told Reuters in an interview.
Nowhere did Opel sell more cars in 2011 than in its domestic market, Europe's largest. Yet its share has steadily eroded in recent years to record lows - a key factor that has contributed to Opel's incessant flow of red ink. Despite winning two of the last four prestigious European Car of the Year awards with the Insignia and Ampera, the brand has been unable to shed its working class image in Germany and move upmarket where debilitating incentive wars are less common.
Chronic speculation over a possible sale or even controlled bankruptcy partly stoked by GM itself has not helped.
Opel, which now needs to drastically lower its breakeven point by once again cutting thousands of jobs, plans to present a long-term business plan on June 28 that will likely entail the closure of its Bochum manufacturing plant in Germany.
Higher sales are an absolute must for Opel, but official data for May showed new car registrations falling twice as fast as the overall German car market compared to the previous year.
Given figures were even worse earlier this year, Labbe believes the downward trend has stopped: "May was a good month for us. Official data shows our market share rose (over April) to 7.9 percent and currently we expect this to improve further."
The new Zafira Tourer MPV, built exclusively in the endangered Bochum plant, has played a crucial role. Opel nearly doubled its share of the domestic van market to 20 percent in the first four months of this year thanks to the model.
Labbe played down speculation that Opel was artificially inflating sales, a claim recently made by Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer at the CAR-Center Automotive Research in Duisburg.

Copyright Reuters, 2012

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