GM's natty LaCrosse tribute to Chinese design
The commercial success of General Motors' Buick LaCrosse in the Chinese and US markets has greatly boosted Shanghai's bid to be an automotive design center with the capability of conceiving cars that win the hearts of critics and consumers around the world.
Distinguished by an entirely new body inside and out, the 2010 LaCrosse, which made its market debut last month, was largely designed and engineered in the Shanghai studio of Pan Asia Technical Automotive Center, one of the two joint ventures between GM and Shanghai Automotive Industry Corp. The partners have another joint venture in Shanghai for manufacturing.
The LaCrosse project was led by Cao Min, who was responsible for the exterior, and Liu Nenghua, for the interior, according to New York Times, which carried a glowing review of the car bearing a nameplate that US motorists have learned to deride. Unsurprisingly, GM has been selling more cars, many of them Buicks, in China than in the US since 2006.
