General Motors Company (GM): Where Will It Find Growth in Europe?

The problems go beyond that, of course. As with the Detroit automakers last decade, Europe’s automakers have too many factories, too much bureaucracy, and too-rich deals with powerful labor unions. The cars and trucks that they are selling aren’t enough to pay the costs of an infrastructure built when sales were higher and expectations were more optimistic.

Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F), Europe’s second-biggest-selling automaker after VW, announced its own overhaul plan last year. In typical Ford style, it’s well-thought-out, complete, and decisive: Ford is closing factories, cutting staff, and bringing new categories of vehicles (like SUVs) from its global portfolio to Europe for the first time in a bid to increase market share.

Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F)’s success in turning around its North American operation give its European plan big credibility. It should work out well for the Blue Oval.

But for General Motors Company (NYSE:GM), the challenge of fixing Opel has proven to be a tougher nut to crack. Akerson began his push to fix Opel late in 2011 when he moved to put several of GM’s top global executives on Opel’s board. Work continued throughout 2012, with management changes and product enhancements.

Now, Opel has a new CEO, VW veteran Karl-Thomas Neumann, and a deal with its troublesome German labor union that should lead to much-needed savings. Akerson announced last week that Opel would receive $5.2 billion from GM through 2016 to finance a series of new products.

And Opel has plans to boost its presence, and hopefully its sales, in places like Russia. Will it be enough to end more than a decade of losses? We’ll find out.

The article Where Will GM Find Growth in Europe? originally appeared on Fool.com is written by John Rosevear.

Motley Fool contributor John Rosevear owns shares of Ford and General Motors. Follow him on Twitter at @jrosevear. The Motley Fool recommends Ford and General Motors. The Motley Fool owns shares of Ford.

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