Source: Newsday - 03/12/05

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Motor Matters
by Herb Shuldiner

General Motors is striving to develop more “halo” vehicles in an effort to put passion back into its products and curtail the use of incentives to move its cars. In the auto business, a halo vehicle is an icon — one that radiantly stands out in the lineup, much as the Corvette is a halo vehicle for Chevrolet

Mark Reuss, vice president of performance vehicles says that his aim to to create one performance halo vehicle for every GM division

Most of all he wants to achieve performance leadership over BMW and other German brands that are generally recognized as the best performing cars in the world.

“We want to lead. We don’t want to copy the imports,” Reuss says. “I don’t want parity with Mercedes AMG and BMW M Series vehicles. I want to beat them, because I never want to be in a position of having to explain why my car isn’t as good.”

He concedes GM is not competitive with those brands yet, but promises the new Cadillac STS V and XLR-V coming later this year will outperform the best that Germany has to offer.

Reuss notes that the Cadillac CTS-V already outperforms the BMW M3 and the Mercedes C-Class AMG, but adds that GM’s performance vehicle strategy will differ markedly from that of Mercedes.

The German carmaker offers an AMG version of every model except the M Class sport utility vehicle, BMW offers the M3, a more powerful version of its 3 Series line An M5 is due later this year and an M6 is to follow. There are no M Series models for BMW’s SUVs or its flagship 7 Series.

Reuss says that the CTS-V already has helped make Cadillac a cool brand again. Buyers of this high-performance vehicle earn an average income of $209,000, about $100,000 more than other Cadillac owners. They also are a decade younger than the average Cadillac buyer, and Reuss says 38 percent of CTS-V buyers had last owned a German import.

GM s other halo vehicles include the Chevrolet SSR, Cobalt SS Supercharged and TrailBlazer SS. Reuss is particularly happy with the Cobalt SS Supercharged because it will cost only about $21,000 and appeal to the tuner market.

He would like to do a performance version of the Chevy Colorado pickup. “I could put a V-8 in that" he says.

Reuss also would like to create a performance coupe for Chevrolet, but cautions that this doesn’t mean the Camaro will return. However, it’s clear- that Chevrolet needs an exciting performer that can compete with the
Ford Mustang.

Also on Reuss’ performance priority list is the Cadillac SRX-V SUV and a Redline version of the upcoming Saturn Sky roadster.

Reuss adds he would like to do a performance version of the Pontiac Solstice and a car for Buick so each of those brands would have at least one halo model. However, Reuss says there are no plans yet to produce a performance model for GMC.

Does the commg era of high fuel economy emphasis portend the end of performance vehicles? Not in Reuss’ view. He envisions doing performance versions of hybrids and even fuel-cell vehicles.

“We don’t have a current plan to set a land speed record on the Bonneville Flats for a fuel-cell vehicle. Preliminary discussions with Larry Burns, vice president of research and development and planning, about doing that iii the future have taken place," Reuss says.