GAC Motor, one of China's fastest-growing automakers, announced its new brand - "The Road to Greatness" - at its 10th anniversary ceremony on Saturday.

The new brand has been in the works since last year, when GAC Motor launched its effort to update its corporate brand and culture. The company interviewed 10 groups of its customers, employees and partners to better understand its brand development and core competitiveness.

To GAC Motor, "greatness" means dreaming, responsibility, essence, ascendance and truth - and these terms will serve as guidelines for management in the future, as the company aims to take the lead in China in the future through innovation, said Yu Jun, president of GAC Motor.

The new brand essence is aligned with the company's long-held belief in greatness through innovation, he added.

As China's self-owned automobile company, GAC Motor was established in Guangzhou, Guangdong province in 2008, and has become a leading automobile brand through continuous technological innovation and market development.

The company launched its first concept car in 2009 and attended the North American International Auto Show in 2013 for the first time, marking its initiative to go global.

In 2017, GAC Motor witnessed its millionth car roll of the assembly line in May and launched its GM8, the first Chinese high-end MPV, in December. The company posted sales of more than 500,000 cars in the whole year.

Its vehicles have served as official cars for several international events including the 16th Asian Games in Guangzhou, Guangdong province in 2010, the G20 Summit in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province in 2016, the Summer Davos in Dalian, Liaoning province, the BRICS Summit in Xiamen, Fujian province, and the 2017 Fortune Global Forum in Guangzhou, as well as the nation's two sessions of top legislative and political advisory bodies in Beijing for the past few years.

GAC Motor has adopted a global interdisciplinary research and development system to realize innovation in the fields of production, marketing, branding and development. It has established an intelligent manufacturing system, setting up factories in Guangzhou, Hangzhou and the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region that maximize the value of the company's industrial chain. The Guangzhou factory has integrated advanced technological equipment resources to produce an automobile through modular layout, maximizing efficiency and minimizing transportation costs.

Currently, the company can produce a car every 57 seconds and has the capacity to produce more than 1,800 cars a day.

According to the 2017 China Initial Quality Study released by J.D. Power, the US-based global marketing information services company, GAC Motor has topped the list of Chinese brands for five consecutive years. The company has also incorporated the practice of sustainable development into its business. For example, it has been committed to building automobiles that promote ecological harmony through a green process, producing cars that protect the environment by saving energy and reducing emissions and consumptions.

In 2016, GAC Motor signed a cooperation framework agreement through 2020 with the administration of the Sanjiangyuan, or Three-River-Source National Park and the World Wildlife Fund to build China's first national park and aid in ecological protection for the Sanjiangyuan area in Qinghai province.

In response to the Belt and Road Initiative, the company has been deployed in 15 countries in five major sectors, including the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Eastern Europe and Africa, and has initially built a well-established overseas team, setting up two R&D centers in North America to promote its entry into the market.

This year, GAC Motor plans to set up an international branch in Hong Kong and a sales branch in the United States, and will take part in the international motor shows in Moscow and Paris for the first time.

GAC Motor will carry out targeted international strategic deployment in the areas of brand building, team training and product introduction, building out its industrial chain advantages on a global scale and taking its product and brand upgrades worldwide. In the next five years, GAC Motor is expected to launch more than seven new energy models, including hybrid, extended and pure electric products.

During the 13th Five-year Plan (2016-20), the company plans to launch 20 to 30 models to create a competitive product mix, aiming to become a world-class brand and global company with an annual capacity of 1 million vehicles by 2020; new energy vehicles are expected to account for about 10 percent of the total production and sales volume.

As a new starting point for the development of GAC Motor's independent business, the company's leaders have pledged to meet challenges and overcome difficulties with a positive attitude, firm confidence and enterprising spirit, providing a solid momentum for continued growth. The automobile is not only a vehicle for travel, but also a carrier of dreams and pleasure, Yu said: "We are creating an enjoyable life of mobility as our brand mission."

liangkaiyan@chinadaily.com.cn

GAC Motor defines its new brand essence as "the road to greatness". Photos provided to China Daily

(China Daily 07/24/2018 page15)