NASHVILLE, TENN. (WTVF) — General Motors employs more than 5,000 people in the Spring Hill area. It has helped Tennessee become a car manufacturing giant and been credited for much of the Maury County area's boom.
This week NewsChannel 5's Rebecca Schleicher spoke with GM President of Global Markets Rory Harvey out of Detroit about the company's future. His past role was the company's President of North America.
The big local project on the horizon is the Ultium electric battery plantto service GM that is set to open in Spring Hill by the end of March. But it comes after a few months of delays.
"Like everything we went through last year, there was a little bit of volatility in the EV market, for example. So therefore we did a stop, breathe and refocus of everything," Harvey explained after the plant did not meet the initial production deadline for late 2023.
The plant is currently hiring and will employ an additional 1,000 to 2,000 people.
The company's car manufacturing plant is currently producing the electric Cadillac Lyriq. Which GM is touting as one of the company's major successes of 2023.
"If you look to the Lyriq, December was its strongest month since launch and if you look to the month of January we're having a time this month as well," Harvey said. "The Lyriq is being very well received by customers."
Schleicher noted "you mentioned a bit of a softening in the market, and we just had a huge winter blast with EV drivers learning that batteries don’t do so great in that really extreme cold. Plus sales seem to have slowed recently for EVs. Does that worry you at all?"
Harvey said the key is the flexibility of the company to respond to current demand, whatever that is.
"I would say no it doesn’t (bother me). General Motors is in a strong position in terms of the fact that we have combustion engine vehicles in our portfolio and we have electric vehicles in our portfolio, so we’re able to flex dependent on customer demand."
"If you look to Spring Hill as an example," he continued "it makes the XT5 the XT6 which are internal combustion engines and it also makes the Cadillac Lyriq."
Industry insiders expect a record-breaking 10 percent penetration for electric vehicles this year, after a highest-ever 7 percent in 2023.
In an investor call Tuesday, GM CEO Mary Barra said the company plans to produce between 200,000 and 300,000 electric vehicles in 2024. And Harvey confirmed GM is still on track for all of its light duty vehicles to be electric by 2035.
The recent United Auto Workers Union walkout and strike set GM back 95,000 vehicles, Barra said. Members eventually agreed to a deal that dramatically raised pay and offered cost-of-living adjustments.
"We have challenged the organization in terms of the areas that we're going to make the savings," Harvey said.
Local UAW President John Rutherford said in a phone call this week that employees are generally happy with the results and believe the future for GM is bright in Middle Tennessee.
Harvey said investing in people is critical.
"We should send a big thank you to all of the employees because they were key to all of the 2023 results," Harvey said. "Spring Hill is our largest complex in the US, so it is significant."
But this week, GM execs said they have to do better and earn back public trust in wake of the Cruise Robotaxi crash, where a pedestrian was dragged some 20 feet when the self-driving vehicle did not emergency stop.
Schleicher asked Harvey about it.
"A lot of us saw them (Cruises) around the Nashville area being tested pretty frequently before they were pulled off the streets. In the investor call execs said there would be a new 'road map' for the Cruise. What does that mean?"
"It basically means we had an incident...and that’s an opportunity for us to look at the business overall," he continued "we are still going to invest significantly in terms of Cruise through calendar year 2024, but we need to learn the lessons, we need to build relationships and then we need to accelerate."
The crash rocked the entire autonomous vehicle market, with safety as a top concern.
"Personally I don’t think people should be worried about safety," Harvey said. "If you look at it there is plenty of data out there that is from independent third parties that the safety of autonomous vehicles specifically in comparison to regular individuals driving vehicles."
Barra said there is a sense of urgency to fix both screen and software issues.
GM staff in Spring Hill say both the manufacturing plant and the new battery plant are currently hiring.
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