GM expects to sell more than 3 mi of cars in China this year

Shanghai (Reuters)-c
Tsien identified luxury vehicles, SUVs and compact cars as three areas of growth of GM in China, reiterating plans to launch 60 new models and updated until 2018 in the largest market in the world.
"The Cadillac certainly has momentum in this country. We believe that the luxury market here will become the largest in the world in 2016, "said Tsien at a media event in Shanghai, estimating that sales of Cadillac should exceed 70 million vehicles this year, up from 50 billion mark last year.
The compact car market is also an important battlefield for GM because it is the largest segment of the market for passenger cars in China, Tsien said in announcing the company's accumulated sales in China had reached 20 million units.
GM, which sells cars from brands like Chevrolet, Buick and Cadillac, lost the first place of the Chinese market last year to the German rival Volkswagen.
The two companies have already announced aggressive expansion strategies. GM plans to invest 12 billion dollars in China between 2014 and 2017, while VW plans to spend $ 18.2 billion euros (23.39 billion dollars) by 2018 in the country.
To promote its image in China, GM and the Shanghai Disney Resort closed an agreement by which Chevrolet will become the official vehicle of the resort and will have a presence at the planned Shanghai Disneyland.
(By Samuel Shen and Kazunori Takada)