French auto manufacturers, Peugeot Citroën are mulling the possibility of building cars at the GM facility in India. Peugeot Citroën and GM have entered into a global alliance recently. Gregoire Olivier, head of Asian operations, said that they would not go ahead with building their own plants in India as per earlier plan. Now that they have GM as an ally and GM has manufacturing plants in India, they are looking forward to save the $850 million investment.
Peugeot is likely to enter the Indian market with a small car and a compact car. After its exit in 1997, Peugeot has been seeking to re-enter the ever growing Indian market for the last three years.
GM company spokeswoman said that GM had no plans to assemble Peugeot cars in India. GM chief executive Dan Akerson told reporters in Beijing that the Alliance was essentially a Euro-centric play without denying the possibilities of similar co-operation for the Asian or South-American markets.
We think that Peugeot Citroën will be more than happy to pursue the alliance in India which would give them better financial flexibility citing the continual economic downturn in Europe.
