GWM confirms luxury Wey brand for Australia

GWM has confirmed it will introduce its luxury Wey sub-brand as a line-up of premium plug-in hybrid models alongside the growing Haval, Tank and Cannon families.

The confirmation ends years of tenuous updates on the sub-brand, with GWM Australia repeatedly saying it was considering the brand without having yet made a business decision.

However, GWM Australia and New Zealand chief operating officer John Kett told media this week Wey had finally been green lit for Australia as part of a strategy that will introduce new models and expand the local GWM network.

“The Wey brand will come to Australia, and it’s very much tied into what we need to do with our brand, but certainly around upgrading our network, there’ll be certain conditions under which dealers will get access to the Wey brand,” he said.

Those conditions are according to the company’s growth strategy dubbed ‘Rise’, which invites existing dealers to invest in their GWM infrastructure, preparing the ground for more premium and impressive brick and mortar dealerships, as well as more efficient aftersales service.

“The dealers need to invest in larger stores so that we can really showcase all of our brands and their portfolio within that store,” Kett said of the new strategy.

While the various other GWM sub brands offer a diverse range of powertrains such as mild hybrid, turbo-petrol, diesel and pure electric, the Wey family will be represented exclusively by plug-in hybrids.

The exact local line-up is yet to be confirmed but as part of GWM’s Tech Day in Melbourne this week, the company flew in an example of the Gaoshan – a move likely to herald the incoming range.

Gaoshan is the model’s name in Native Chinese market, with the large luxury people mover on show alongside a number of confirmed Tank and Haval models, however, for its Melbourne debut it wore a G9 moniker – its branding in Malaysia, which likely indicates its badging for Australia.

It’s also understood the Blue Mountain large premium SUV is the second model likely to enter local showrooms.

GWM has previously announced it will introduce seven new models or variants within 12 months, and the Tank 500 Hi4-T, which arrives this month, completes those seven.

Therefore, GWM has confirmed those new Wey-badged models will make up the numbers in potentially another seven models over the next 12 months.

“We were going to have seven new model launches this year,” GWM Australia marketing and communications boss Steve Maciver said.

“The Tank 500 Hi4-T that we’ve launched this week, today was the seventh new model launched this year. We’ll have that meeting at least next year. So seven potentially.” Pricing is also another detail yet to be finalised, but when asked if Wey’s premium models might break into the $100,000 territory, Maciver said: “We’re not going to even get close to six figures”.

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