Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co., Ltd. (Tengzhong), a private Chinese firm who has struck a preliminary deal with General Motors Corp. (GM) for the premium SUV brand Hummer, said Wednesday it has no plan to manufacture Hummer in a Chinese plant.
File photo taken on March 11, 2009 shows Hummer CEO James Taylor (R) presenting a Hummer model to a local official in Deyang, southwest China's Sichuan Province. U.S. automaker General Motors Corp., a day after filing Chapter 11 bankruptcy, has a tentative deal to sell its Hummer brand to Chinese-based Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co., Ltd., the automaker said on June 2.
"Rather than setting up a plant in China, Tengzhong will use the current facilities including their employees in the United States," said Zhao Xiaolu, spokesman for the ongoing transaction for Tengzhong, a leading manufacturer of road, construction and energy industry equipment based in southwest China's Sichuan Province,
Zhao works for the Brunswick Group, which is handling the public relations matters for the Tengzhong deal. Tengzhong's managers were not available for comment on the transaction, which was disclosed Tuesday, a day after GM filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
According to an overall restructuring plan, the U.S. based automaker GM will shed off its none-core assets including Hummer, Saturn, Saab and Pontiac.
The preliminary deal allows Tengzhong to keep the management and operational team along with the Hummer brand, and secure more than 3,000 jobs in the United States. The Chinese buyer will also assume existing dealer agreements relating to Hummer's dealership network.
Tengzhong CEO Yang Yi said in a statement Tuesday that the company will "allow Hummer to innovate under the leadership and continuity of its current management team".
James Taylor, Hummer chief executive officer, went to Chengdu City and Deyang City, Tengzhong's current base and new base under construction, to discuss project cooperation with local officials in March.
"This transaction, if successful," said Taylor in a statement Tuesday," will allow us to embark on a more aggressive global expansion, ensuring a successful future with our new partners."
According to Zhao, Tengzhong will use internal fund and bank loan to make the transaction, which will be a "strategic move for the company to expand into the premium off-road vehicle segment". Formed in 2005 through a series of mergers, Tengzhong currently has more than 4,800 employees.
"It is probably more attractive for Chinese enterprise like Tengzhong to learn from the foreign brand's past successful experience in research, design, marketing and service," said Guo Guoqing, a professor with the School of Business, Renmin University of China.
Xu Zhaohui, head of the Sichuan Provincial Department of Commerce, said the officials will "strive to serve the transaction", which is expected to close in the third quarter of this year and is subjected to customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals.
In recent years, there have been several headline purchases of foreign auto brands by Chinese enterprises.
