"Haval is not just another Brand, we are very customer orientated, as we truly understand that without happy customers, we simply don't have a business." This was the opening line to the welcome message from National Sales Manager, Tyrone Alberts when he addressed the Western Cape Haval and GWM owners at the recently held owners weekend for the area.

GWM made its debut in the South Africa pick up market in March 2007. For the past 12 years, the GWM brand has gathered fans with our highly affordable and superb quality Single and Double Cab bakkies. The GWM brand has grown consistently over the years and so has our product range. We are now proud of a stable sporting an urban SUV and four different Steed models with multiple variants. Most recently we launched the all new Steed 5 facelift that has been met positively by the South African public.

Leading in China, Aiming for the world!

HAVAL global cumulative sales have exceeded 5 Million units.

On January 13, with the theme of "Leading in China, Aiming for the world", the HAVAL Global 5-million-sales Celebration Ceremony and Global Strategic Conference was held at the HAVAL R&D Center in Baoding. HAVAL owners, Chinese and foreign experts, partners and over 500 media from all over the world gathered to share HAVAL's success and joy at the company reaching the Global 5-million-sales cumulative sales mark and witness the release of the "521" Globalization Strategic Blueprint of the SUV powerhouse, a map of the future plans to increase the brands global footprint.

On September 28^th, GWM Pickup Truck announced China's leading LCV brand's determination to reach its goal of being in the top three LCV brands in the world. At the launch event, Great Wall Motors announced its vision of being "China's No. 1 pickup brand, building No. 1 choice for Chinese consumers, and finally making GWM one of the world's top three pickup brands". To do this, GWM released the "Six-Star Strategy" to ramp up their efforts in upgrading the brand and open a new era for GWM Pickup Truck. Steed 7, a brand-new premium high-end pickup model, also made an appearance at the launch.

Pickup, was announced as the next big thing following SUV at this strategy conference, GWM Pickup Truck, as the segment leader, interpreted the development trend of pickup in China and the world, showing its vision for the future and their strong sense of responsibility to the segment.

Globally, pickup has always been one of the most popular and largest sales segments and the most active base for a car loving culture. However, sales volumes of pickup vehicles in China only account for about 1.3% of the total market due to policy restrictions. With the deregulation of the policy and more encouraging circumstances, the Chinese domestic pickup market is bound to release its huge potential. The market potential, consumer demands and deregulation are accelerating a turning point in the industry. It is no doubt a significant strategic opportunity for GWM Pickup Truck whose track record boasts multiple industrial milestones with their stand out achievement being "No. 1 selling pickup for 20 consecutive years".

On August 29th, the 2018 Moscow International Auto Show arrived on schedule. The Haval brand brought its glory to the heavyweight models F7, H6, H9 and HB-03 concept cars. Haval's participation in this exhibition is not only for the warm-up of the upcoming products, but also shows the strong brand appeal to the world, further enhancing the international popularity.

The highlight of the Haval Auto Show was the first appearance of the Haval F7 in Russia. The Haval F7 is positioned as a compact SUV and is the flagship product of the Haval brand in accordance with the international development route. At the auto show, Phil Simmons, vice president of Great Wall Motors and Haval brand styling, vividly interpreted the design concepts of the F7 and F series., He said that Haval F7 would shape the spirit of intelligence, and create the four major consumer values of excellent appearance, intellectual technology, tough power and ultimate security for the tech savvy by means of smart technology, and surpass the leading intelligent technology and enterprising young attitude.

On August 20, 2018. - Great Wall Motor (GWM) New Energy officially launched its all-new independent brand of new energy vehicles. ORA is the first of the mainstream car companies to brand its new energy car business. The ORA iQ, a pure electric crossover SUV, will be launched at the Chengdu Auto Show. This is another major move by the Great Wall Motor Group in the field of new energy after its joint venture with BMW.

Ning Shuyong, vice president of Great Wall Motor Co., Ltd. and general manager of the new Ora brand, said: "The Great Wall Motor Group set up a new energy vehicle research group a decade ago. It has been developing electric vehicles for ten years and is dedicated to research and development. Great Wall insists on developing new energy vehicles. Instead of changing from oil to electricity, a bigger consideration is the healthy development of the new energy vehicle market."

ORA: "New Generation Electric Cars" for the New Urban Youth

Great Wall Motor named the new energy brand ORA, hoping to commemorate the world famous mathematician, Mr. Leonhard Euler. Mr. Euler is well known for his "Eulerian Theorem" and "Eulerian Formula". He did only make great contributions to the mathematics community, but also pushed mathematics into the physical field, including ballistics, rigid body mechanics, and fluid mechanics.

Great Wall Motor decided to use the "Ora" to name the new energy vehicle brand because mathematics is the foundation of human science and technology innovation, and also the core and premise of automobile design and research and development.

[Beijing/Berlin July 10, 2018] Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and German Chancellor Angela Merkel presided over the fifth round of Chinese-German inter-governmental consultation in Berlin. Witnessed by Chinese and German government officials, the joint venture contract is entered into between Great Wall Motor Company Limited (hereinafter referred to as GWM) and BMW Holding B.V. (hereinafter referred to as BMW).

According to the Contract, the joint venture with 50% of the shares held by GWM and BMW respectively is named: Spotlight Automotive Ltd., with a registered capital of RMB 5.1 Billion (approx.R10.2 Billion). The registered address is in Zhangjiagang, in the Jiangsu Province. The Board of Directors consists of six members, in which the chairman is appointed by GWM and the Vice Chairman by BMW, serving a total of four years. The JV has planned an international advanced vehicle plant with an annual standard capacity of 160,000 vehicles. This is the first BEV (Battery Electric Vehicle) joint venture project for the BMW Group worldwide and the bridgehead for the GWM New Energy Vehicles (NEV) to enter the global market.

On April 25, Auto China 2018 kicked off. With the theme of "NEW HAVAL", HAVAL, the "SUV leader", brought its brand-new product line F series, H4, H6 Coupe, H6, H7 (2018 version) , H9-8AT and other major models to the show, leading a new trend of Chinese SUV market upgrade against the background of new consumption.

F Series SUV Made its First Appearance, with Intelligent, Satisfying Personalized Demands

2018 is a strategically important year for GWM. As a down-to-earth automobile enterprise, GWM set its first goal this year to build a technological brand. GWM, adhering to the principle of "Low-key Life, High-profile Work", started independent R&D and production of power system a dozen years ago. Up to this day, GWM has made significant breakthroughs in numerous automobile technology fields, particularly in powertrain field where a technological revolution has been completed successfully. The self-developed 1.5GDIT engine is awarded as 2017 "Chinese Heart" Annual Top Ten Engines and the 7DCT (wet-type) as the World Top Ten Transmissions.

On April 3, GWM took new Haval H6 equipped with 1.5GDIT as a representative and invited a number of media friends throughout the country to share "Go-ahead Technological Revolution" of powertrain.

The eagle-eyed and inquisitive might have noticed a flurry of activity around  Haval and GWM's massive parts warehouse in Durban - what with loaded trucks leaving the premises, signaling "good-bye" to this facility. A facility that has done sterling duty for over a decade.

And - before we go any further - remember that the two companies are intertwined, with Haval as a purveyor of posh SUVs basically being a prestige sub-brand of Great Wall Motors.

Recently, Brand Finance, a recognized third-party brand evaluation firm of UK, published a ranking list - Top 100 most valuable auto brands 2018, in which 21 auto brands of China are included.

The most notable one is HAVAL, the SUV leader- HAVAL, with its value jumped in rank from 29th in the last year to 16th in 2018, is included in the rank of global top 20, and also moves ahead of such world famous auto brands as Ferrari, Tesla, Aston Martin and Volvo. What's more, HAVAL goes ahead of other automobile enterprises in China and ranks the first among the most valuable auto brands of China.

Hydrogen Council issued its new comers on March 13. There are 6 steering committees like GWM, 3M and National Energy Administration and 5 supporting members like Hexagon. It should be noticed that GWM is the first Chinese automobile enterprise member of Hydrogen Council. Meanwhile, Audi, BMW, Daimler, GM, Honda, Hyundai, Toyota and other well-known multinational auto corporations are members of Hydrogen Council

Hydrogen Council was set up in 2017 Davos World Economic Forum and it aims to promote development of hydrogen technology in global energy structure transition and curb global warming. In addition to famous automakers, Anglo American plc, Air Liquide (France), Iwatani, Linde, Shell, Statoil, Total, etc. are also members of Hydrogen Council.

It has to rate as one of the most undersung secrets on the South African automotive scene – and now it's back.

Yup, it's the GWM H5. And I, for one, am delighted that it's been refreshed and reintroduced after a brief absence from the sales charts.