GWM is one of South Africa’s most prominent up-and-coming automotive brands, and it has a lot planned for our market.
The Chinese carmaker recently held the launch of its dedicated Tank 4×4 division with its first model, the 300, during which time representatives from the company gave further insight into what is in store for local motorists over the coming years.
Lots to look forward to
GWM (Great Wall Motors) and its subsidiary Haval have been in South Africa since 2007, and their popularity has been steadily increasing with models like the Haval Jolion crossover placing in the top 20 best-selling cars in 2023.
The automaker has its sights set a lot higher than this, however, as it plans to become a top five best-selling brand in South Africa.
It is not far off this target either, as Haval Motors South Africa came in eighth place in February 2024 with 1,656 units sold, putting it ahead of both Chery and Renault.
It’s certainly an impressive stat, but the manufacturer will need to increase its output by at least 500 vehicles per month to break into the top five, as brands like Nissan, Hyundai, and Ford achieve more than 2,000 sales on a regular basis, and the top three brands – Suzuki, VW, and Toyota – are all finding more than 5,000 customers every month.
South Africa-bound Haval Jolion Pro
To accomplish its sales goal, GWM is adopting an aggressive marketing strategy with several new models planned for our market this year.
Haval is receiving the updated Jolion, as well as the new H7 (known as the Big Dog in China), which will sit above the H6 as the flagship of the brand.
The Tank 300’s bigger sibling, the Tank 500, is also coming to South Africa, and the P-Series bakkie is getting a new range-topping model called the P500.
Further down the line, the manufacturer wants to release hybrid (HEV) versions of its entire portfolio in South Africa, though it has already made substantial progress on this goal with HEV options on the Jolion, H6, Tank 300, and the upcoming 500.
It’s also worth mentioning that GWM is responsible for the all-electric Ora brand, whose first car, the 03 hatchback, is the cheapest battery-powered car in the country right now.
There is one other GWM sub-brand called WEY, which produces MPVs in China, but the company is not planning to bring it here anytime soon as it is currently reserved for left-hand-drive markets.
Looking at the global picture, Great Wall Motors wants to reach 1 million unit sales worldwide annually, and to accomplish this it wants to create a 50:50 production model with half of all its units coming from China while the other half will be produced in other countries.
Ideally, the carmaker wants to have 40% of the cars it sells in each market to be locally made, which could potentially result in a GWM factory being built in South Africa, though it hasn’t explicitly confirmed any plans for this.
The company invested 12.2 billion yuan (R32 billion) in its Research and Development wing in 2022 and has dedicated test centres for all manner of conditions, including extreme temperatures, winds, and even altitude, which has allowed all of its recent models to achieve 5-star NCAP safety ratings in both the Euro and Australasian markets.
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