General Motors Corp.

            General Motors Corporation was founded in 1908 and is the largest automaker in the world. In the past 76 years General Motors Corporation has been the global leader in terms of vehicle sales. Currently General Motors employs about 284,000 employee’s world wide. General Motor’s current top leadership is comprised of Richard Wagoner, Jr. as the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Frederick (Fritz) A. Henderson as the GM Vice Chairman, Global product development (www.gm.com/company/corp_info/)

Headquarter Location

            General Motors Corporation has its Headquarters in Detroit, United States. GM as General Motors Corporation is called in abbreviation has many subsidiaries in many parts of the world. These are distributed in Europe, Asia, Pacific, Africa/Middle East, South America and North America. For example, in Africa and Middle East GM subsidiaries are found in Egypt, Israel, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, and Tunisia. In South America branches are in Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Paraguay, while in North America subsidiaries are found in Canada, Mexico and the United States.

Key Products and Services

            General Motors Corporation is known for manufacture of cars and trucks in 33 countries in the World. For instance, 9.1 million cars and trucks were sold globally under various brands in 2006. These brands are the Cadillac, Buick, Chevrolet, Pontiac, Saab, GMC, GM Daewoo, Holden, HUMMER, Vauxhall and Saturn.

            General Motors has good current offers on sale. Examples include the FM certified used vehicles. These are used cars which have been refurbished to guarantee reliability and affordability. There is also the card member service where people apply for a GW reward card to enable the member to accumulate earnings that could lead to the next GM vehicle. Another offer is the GM mobility reimbursement where participants cold get up to $1000 plus 2 extra years of Onstar. The brands participating in this program include Buick, Chevrolet, Cadillac, HUMMER, GMG, Pontiac and Saturn.

Key customers

            General Motors key customers or the largest market is the United States. Other major customer bases for this company’s products and services include China, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Germany. Minor parts of GM’s market are distributed all over the world in and around the countries or a region with GM’s operating groups or subsidiaries. In these countries and regions the customers range from those purchasing cars for private use, official use in companies to those buying trucks for use in the public transport sectors or transport of commercial goods.

Form of Business Ownership

            General Motors is a corporation which means it is a limited company.

Key Competitive Advantages

General Motors Corporation enjoys the following competitive advantages.

1. The general Motors Onstar subsidiary leads in vehicle safety security and information services. This makes General Motors stand out as the company of choice when it comes to automobile industry.
2. General Motors is committed to corporate responsibility. Having a good corporate responsibility does a great job in marketing the company’s products.
3. General Motors’s brands names are highly selling in the World e.g. Cadillac, Opel, HUMMER, Buick, Chevrolet, Pontiac, Holden, Vauxhall
4. General Motors products are known for being of high quality all over the world.
5. General Motors has great financial strength which makes it possible to operate its expansive business empire across the globe. To strengthen its financial position General Motors has invested in other automotive companies in various countries in the World.

References

General Motors: Company information: corporate information. Available at

www.gm.com/company/corp_info/  accessed on June 23, 2007.