General Motors posted its first quarterly profit in almost three years today — a victorious declaration of its financial rehabilitation. It only took a major bailout, the slashing of several vehicle brands, and massive layoffs to turn things around, but the outlook is good — and made even shinier by a forthcoming line of exciting new products, capped off by the plug-in Chevy Volt.
GM reporting a surprisingly high $865 million profit for the first quarter of 2010, a huge turnabout from last year’s loss of $6 billion during the same period. Analysts and legislators are now predicting (or rather, looking forward to) a public stock offering that will let the company pay back its $52 billion in debt to the U.S. and Canadian governments. Right now, it technically owns 61 percent of the company, according to the Los Angeles Times.
But GM will probably wait to launch its impending products before going this route, hoping to maintain profitability through the end of the year. The Volt will play no small part in helping this along.
Dead brands like Saturn, Pontiac, Saab and Hummer have been swept away and replaced with revamped Chevrolet, Buick, Cadillac and GMC lines. And so far, this plan has worked like a charm. Combined, new models like the Chevrolet Equinox and Camaro, Buick Lacrosse and Cadillac SRX have sold three times the number of units in April as their retired peers did in the past.
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The fall has more in store, including the Chevy Cruze, Silverado and of course Volt — which has been responsible for much of the company’s positive press during an undeniably gloomy year of staff cuts and factory closures. Now, suddenly, GM is back in contention for almost $15 billion from the U.S. Department of Energy via the Advanced Technology Vehicles Program.
While its resurgence is admirable, GM will still face some fierce competition from Nissan and Ford — which managed to avert disaster during the economic crisis. Both companies have bold green submissions of their own, the Leaf and all-electric Focus, respectively. But GM’s public relations juggernaut has managed to position the Volt as the most consumer-friendly of them all. It will be interesting to see if this is how reality plays out when the Nissan Leaf and Chevy Volt go head to head later this year.
