Holden still committed to V8 sports car

The man with the ominous task of presiding over the closure of GM Holden's Australian manufacturing operations next year says he remains committed to providing Aussies with something fast and fun to drive once the locally-built Commodore ceases to exist.

But GM-H chairman and managing director Mark Bernhard has also questioned the necessity of a V8 sports car in the Holden model range and says any potential model needs to be profitable before it gets the green light for Australia.

"Spiritually it fits into the portfolio," he told motoring.com.au this week. "[But] I think there needs to be a customer value proposition for it as well, and I'm not sure if we have a significant customer value proposition for everyone to have products in their [favourite] segments."

It's the first sign that Holden is pondering the necessity of a sports car within its line-up post-2017 – something promised by GM International supremo Stefan Jacoby who in early 2015 said: "It will be most likely a V8, it will be a sports car and it will be a global car."

The new Holden boss reiterated this commitment, but his language around the sports car's importance suggests the company is not as ebullient about the mystery car as it once was.

"Stefan [Jacoby] has announced we'll have a sports car in the line-up and we will do that. Is it absolutely critical? Maybe, maybe not," he said.

It's unclear exactly which global GM sports car Holden sell beyond the end of next year, when the rear-drive V8-powered Commodore and HSV models are retired – or whether it will be as affordable.

The most likely candidates are the mid-engined replacement for Chevrolet's top-shelf Corvette or a facelifted version of the Camaro, neither of which are currently produced in right-hand drive.

Both V8-powered, rear-drive coupes should be in production by 2019, but neither will be as inexpensive as a Commodore SS, which is currently priced from just $41,490 in ute form.

There's also an outside chance the compact rear-drive Opel GT concept could reach production, but it was powered by a 1.0-litre three-cylinder engine and Holden's German sister brand – which will supply the imported replacement for the current Commodore – is unlikely to sign off a showroom version of the advanced Holden-designed concept.

The replacement for Holden's existing Commodore SS is likely to be a rebadged Opel Insignia OPC/VXR powered by a twin-turbo V6 driving all four wheels and motoring.com.au understands an even hotter HSV version already in development will be quicker than even the hot-shop's current GTS flagship.

However, when Australian-made Commodore stocks run out in 2018, Holden showrooms will be without a V8 model, which so far in 2016 have accounted for as much as 38 per cent of all Commodore sales, following a spike in recent months.

That means that, excluding the doomed Holden Ute, of the 15,223 Commodore sedans and wagons sold this year, 5785 of them had a V8 under their bonnets.

Holden points out that figure is even higher than Ford's wildly successful, sold-out Mustang, which to July this year has attracted 3118 Australian customers.

"It [V8] is the highest penetration of Commodore sales we've ever had," confirmed GM Holden director of communications, Sean Poppitt.

Yet Poppitt insists the 'noise' surrounding Holden's mystery V8 sports car is driven by the media, not customers.

"I think it's more -- in a lot of ways -- what journalists want, not what customers want," he said.

"Stefan Jacoby had confirmed there will be a sports car in our future line-up, so from a brand perspective, and what we stand for spiritually, certainly there's importance on it. But if customers were desperately screaming for one, then there would be a greater need to give them one."

Holden has so far delivered eight of the 24 new models its has promised to release by 2020, but the tempered tone regarding its next sports reflects the onus on the company to ensure significant sales volume and the success of its dealer network in a post-Commodore environment, and Bernhard acknowledged this.

The company will have its hands full as it launches another 16 new models over the next four years – an average of four vehicles per year -- but the Holden boss insists more right-hand drive models will be made available as GM ramps up its support of RHD markets like Australia.

"I think one of the great things about the way GM's looking at the portfolio now is they're doing it with RHD really at the forefront. Part of that's up to us to put our hands up in terms of what products that we see are going to work in this market," he said.

Whether one of those products is a rear-drive V8 remains to be seen.