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Karl Slym, MD of GM in India has his task cut out. But, he is confident that 2008 will be the year of reckoning for the Detroit major in India. By ADITI PRASAD
“I love to win and you’ll soon see GM India celebrating its win in the Indian market,” exclaims a positively exuberant Karl Slym, President and Managing Director of General Motors’s India operations for the last six months. Looking out of the window in his plush 6th floor office at the Global Business Park in Gurgaon, Slym has ample reasons to be excited about all that the year 2008 has in store for him. “This year will be the tipping point for GM in the Indian market,” he gushes. Reasons are clear. The Detroit biggie has had a series of new launches (Chevrolet Spark, UVA, Captiva and Optra Magnum) over the last year, which are boosting sales. In addition, their R&D centre in Bangalore is expanding by the day, where they’ve recently added a design centre too (the first in Asia Pacific) and most importantly, GM’s $300 million plant in Talegaon (Maharashtra) is all set to become operational by August this year, adding a whopping 1,40,000 additional units per annum, to their manufacturing capacity within the country. In addition, beginning 2008, GM’s Halol unit, is also making 85,000 annually, up from 60,000 units last year. “This year is the key. We are in the driving seat, with capacity, marketing and portfolio under control, which puts us in an entirely different position,” explains Slym, who took over the reins of GM India in October last year.
Prior to his India assignment, Slym was based in South Korea and held the dual roles of GM Asia-Pacific Vice-President, Quality, and GM Daewoo Automotive and Technology Vice-President, Quality. Being the sixth chief for GM’s India operations, since it began more than 11 years ago, Slym is off to a better start than any of the others. While the global automaker faced a series of teething troubles in India in its initial years (no thanks to the flop of GM’s upmarket Opel range in India), ever since the launch of the more-mainstream Chevrolet brand five years ago, things have been consistently picking up for them. While in FY 2006-07, GM had a measly 2.5% market share in the country, sitting at the 7th position in the Indian auto bazaar sweepstakes; FY 2007-08 signalled a massive boom for the automaker. With unit sales crossing 59,701 (according to SIAM) and market share zooming to 4.32%, GM claims to have surpassed the unit sales of Toyota and Honda, to move into the 5th place in the Indian auto market. The turn in fortune can be attributed largely to the launch of a series of compact cars (Chevrolet Optra and the UVA hatchnack), which is still the biggest volumes generator in the Indian automobile mart.
What’s more, in a valiant attempt to realise GM’s ambition of nurturing a 10% market share in India by 2010, Slym is now planning to add another small car (in the Spark range) to its kitty. “There are more opportunities in the small car segment in India. There is room for developing more vehicles. We are developing something to be launched within the next two years,” enthuses Slym. He adds that the new small car, will however, not be directly competing with Tata’s Nano. “Bajaj reacted to the Nano first, so it’s clear which market segment will be most affected by Nano’s launch,” he says with a grin. However, at the same time, Slym tips his hat to Ratan Tata’s vision and tenacity with, “Many people have had brilliant concepts and ideas, but only a few have had the perseverance to deliver on those ideas. Hats off to Tata Motors!”
Another strategy that Slym is furiously working on is to move beyond just the Chevy name-plate and bring in more upmarket cars from its global portfolio, in the Indian market. And one name that he rattles off is that of the eminently desirable Cadillac. The bid is to tap the fast-growing luxury car market. “I’m definitely going to go beyond the Chevrolet brand. Although, it suits the requirements of more than 90% of this market, but there is more than just a niche demand for cars such as Cadillac too. After all, in the luxury segment, Audi, BMW and Mercedes, have all been able to show ample growth in India,” he avers.
Moving away from competition, as also from present and future success strategies for India, we launch into Slym’s India experience over the last six months. After all, this is the first time that Slym has had an India posting and seems to be loving every minute of it. “Well, I had visited India before, but those were for short durations, where I merely stayed at 5-Star hotels and could not take in the flavours of real India,” he points out, while telling expansive tales of how now that he’s actually living in the country with his wife, it’s a totally different experience altogether. “India’s not one country. It is like Europe, every few kilometers the tastes and preferences of people change,” he claims.
Slym claims to simply loves the vibrancy and colours of this nation. “I have already been to three grand Indian weddings since I’ve come here and have another one to attend next week,” he exclaims excitedly. And get this, Karl Slym, the consummate corporate honcho is gung-ho on donning a brightly coloured kurta-pyjama for the occasion. Now, that’s called living it up, in typical desi ishtyle!
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Source : IIPM Editorial, 2008
An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).
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