Holden committed to local tuning

Wilting sales won’t discourage Holden from extensive localisation of models it imports from the General Motors global inventory.

A cornerstone of Holden’s transition to a full-line importer has been its commitment to engineering changes to vehicles to make them more suited to Australian conditions.

High-profile influence Holden has had in engineering programs incudes the V6 engine making it into the imported Commodore (nee Opel Insignia), the MY17 Colorado overhaul and a suspension tune for the Astra sedan that has been adopted in the region.

But neither Commodore, Colorado or Astra have been sales stars and the brand overall has plunged down the sales lists since the end of local Commodore production.

But Holden vehicle development manager Jeremy Tassone says there is no question mark over localisation.

Holden’s vehicle development team is a stable 35-people strong across Fishermens Bend and the Lang Lang proving ground.

“I think in this building [Holden] people see that what we do is worthwhile,” said Tassone.

“It is a unique selling point, it is a strength of ours and it is something we can leverage.

“Sales is not my job and I think there are other people working on that and I will do everything I can to support them.

“But I don’t necessarily see it [sales] as a reflection on what we have done.”

Recent commitments to local vehicle development include $7 million spent on resurfacing the Lang Lang proving ground circular track. That was completed just weeks ago.

Tassone manages both the vehicle team and the proving ground.

Tassone admitted his and his team’s frustration at some of the commentary about Holden vehicles.

“The keyboard warriors piss us off, the social media commenters,” he said. “There is all these people who have all these opinions without having driven the cars.

“We are proud of what the cars are. That’s what keeps us coming to work and doing what we do.”

Tassone said his group was gaining increased access to vehicle programs earlier.

“If there was a trend it would be we are getting onboard in all the imported cars earlier than ever before, but it’s still case by case.

“The chief engineers we deal with have all been supportive and interested in our market. Each one of them wants their car to be right for our customers.

“So at the moment we are consolidating and everyone wants us to be doing what we are doing and everyone thinks we are doing a good job of it.”

Despite the good relations Tassone talks about, Holden still hasn’t been able to convince GMC to add a turbo-diesel engine to the options list for the forthcoming Acadia large SUV.