GM CEO says EV race in China is a “race to the bottom”

General Motors CEO Mary Barra said the company has made moves to capitalize on the growing importance of electric vehicles.

Transcript

00:00You know when you look at China there has been a structural change with the shift to electric

00:03vehicles and what in China they call new energy vehicles so either hybrids or electric vehicles

00:09that has caused a shift and you know when you have more than 100 domestic Chinese OEMs

00:15entering the market many most of which are losing money it is exactly as you said Alison it has

00:20become a race to the bottom with pricing and the level of subsidies. Generally I'm a free trader

00:25of give me a level playing playing ground and let's compete based on our product and and how

00:30well we serve the customer but that's the that's the situation we're facing now. Now China is still

00:36an important market it's the largest market and it still has tremendous growth potential so at

00:41GM what we're doing is we're working to restructure the business we're working with our partner

00:45to make sure that we can move forward in a way that we can participate differently and still

00:50give customers choice for vehicles that may not be created in you know from a Chinese OEM that

00:56GM has that references our strong brands the quality and you know for instance right now

01:02with our own retail channel we've just started to take orders for the Chevrolet Tahoe so we think

01:06it's a market after we restructure we can still participate in in an appropriate way and it can

01:11be a business that has growth for General Motors but it's going to take that change.