GAC Auto’s race for the top Aussie 10

GAC Auto wants to join fellow Chinese auto makers BYD, Chery, GWM and MG among Australia’s top 10 sellers and has ambitious plans to get to the top quicker than any of them.

GAC Auto’s Australian arrival isn’t news, but just how quickly it wants to become a mainstream top 10 sales force, is.

And it hasn’t even started selling cars here.

The auto brand will only launch Down Under in late 2025, but GAC International president Wei Haigang was emphatic when asked at the Munich motor show when he wanted to be a top 10 seller.

The answer: “Twenty twenty seven … We will strive for that.”

If it achieves that goal, even on a monthly basis, GAC will get there faster than any other Chinese brand.

Even Chery took a couple of years to crack the 10, as long as you don’t count its original ill-fated period in Australia between 2011-15.

Despite the huge ambition, Haigang said GAC wanted to go about its Australian expansion in the right way.

“We want to have the ambitious goal, but we want to do it step by step,” he said.

“For the network, for the service, and for the customer. So, the volume is not the first, but the service, the satisfaction of the customers.”

GAC will launch in Australia via a factory-owned subsidiary starting with three models including the Aion V, E9 PHEV people-mover and GS3 compact SUV.

It expects to have a launch network of about 30 dealers. From there, it wants to quickly grow to eight models including the small Aion UT EV and a ute that is currently under development.

“We have good product. And not only the product, but the solution for the ecosystem, and the mobility solutions,” said Haigang.

“So we think we want to provide the high quality, high technology, and reliable good products in Australia.”