通用CEO谈未来发展

    全球性公司的运营通常会非常复杂。通用汽车在全球办厂，并在各国开展采购和销售活动。您如何做到运筹帷幄？

    我们尽全力跳出最快的舞步。目前，通用汽车在全球33个国家共设立了167家工厂。我们任何时候为所有这些工厂提供的产品价值总额都高达900亿美元。这是一种非常强大的能量。我们是真正以全球视野来管理公司的产品。包括产品的开发也是如此，我们全球的开发与设计中心都互相联络。

    通用汽车之前并不是一家真正的全球性公司。

    没有必要太过苛刻，其实通用汽车是一家全球性公司。不过，我们的经营方式类似于许多小型公司。几年前，公司仅有14%的产品是在全球平台上完成的。我们的目标是，到2015年之前，实现65%的汽车制造在全球平台上完成。我们可以提高质量、可靠性和耐久性。虽然我们已经实现了很大的跨越，但未来还有许多工作要做。

    目前，汽车行业面临转型。内燃机引擎的历史已经超过了一个世纪，目前许多新技术都可以为机动车提供动力。对于私家非商业应用，电动汽车是否会成为主流？

    其实与1910年的汽车相比，如今的汽车还是四个轮子，还是在使用内燃机引擎。确实，汽车越来越安全、更加宽敞，也更加庞大，现在的汽车都配备了空调和自动变速装置，但并没有发生根本性的变化。

    的确，现在有大批可以替代内燃机的动力技术。首先是电力。在美国，80%的汽车用户每天行驶里程只有40英里，甚至不足40英里。雪佛兰伏特每充电一次便可行驶40英里，另外，它还配有一款小型内燃机引擎，且不会产生机械阻力。不过，人们总是优先充电，实际上伏特汽车使用的始终是电动机。我就曾驾驶我的伏特行驶了3,000英里，仅仅消耗了一加仑汽油。

    一加仑还是一油箱？

    一加仑。但是，要开着车在城里跑，我每天都给汽车充电。其实，如果我愿意的话，我可以驾车在纽约和加利福尼亚之间往返——但如果驾驶全电动汽车则肯定无法做到。所以，从某种程度上来说，这些新型汽车变成了城市汽车。我相信总有一天，汽车每次充电的行驶里程可以超过300英里，到时候，就得考虑怎么给汽车充电的问题了。

    我们研发出一种引擎，目前正准备投放市场，成本大约在1,500美元，引擎有两个燃料箱，其中一个装有压缩天然气，另外一个装有汽油。我们开发这样一种引擎的原因在于美国压缩天然气基础架构尚未普及。而按能量等效来考虑，压缩天然气的价格大约只是汽油的三分之一。所以，这是引领市场改革的另外一种方式。

    The global business can get very complex. You have plants all over the world, and you are sourcing and selling all over the world. How can you stay on top of that?

    We're dancing as fast as we can. There are 167 plants globally in the General Motors universe. We're in 33 countries. At any one time we have about $90 billion of product being shipped to supply those plants. It is formidable. We do manage our products on a global basis. We develop them on a global basis, and we link our development and design centers around the globe.

    GM wasn't always a true global entity.

    Not to be critical, but General Motors was a global company run as many smaller companies. A couple of years ago only 14% of our production was on our global platforms. Our goal by 2015 is to have 65% of our total automotive manufacturing on global platforms. We can improve quality, reliability, and durability. We've made great strides but have more work to do.

    This industry is in transformation. After more than a century with the internal-combustion engine, a lot of technologies can now power a vehicle. For private noncommercial use, is electric going to be predominant?

    The car today vs. the car that was on the road in 1910 is still four-wheel, still run by combustion engine. It's safer, bigger, heavier, it's got air conditioning and an automatic transmission, but it's fundamentally the same game.

    A number of alternative propulsion opportunities are there for us. The first is electric. About 80% of the drivers in America drive 40 miles or less a day. The Volt will drive you 40 miles on a single charge, and then you have a small combustion engine that never experiences mechanical drag. It just cuts in to charge the battery, so you're always on electric motor. I've been driving my Volt for 3,000 miles, and I've used one gallon of gas.

    One gallon or one tank?

    One gallon. But I'm charging my car every day, for around town. If I want to, though, I can drive it from New York to California and back -- you can't do that in an all-electric car. So those to a certain degree are being reduced to urban cars. There will be a day when the average charge will be 300-plus miles, and then you'll have to worry about how to charge it.

    We've developed an engine we're now putting in the market that will cost you on the order of $1,500 and has two reservoirs of energy, one for compressed natural gas and the other for gasoline. Why are we building an engine that can burn either? Because the infrastructure is not ubiquitous enough in this country to have compressed natural gas. On an energy-equivalent basis, compressed natural gas sells for about a third of what gasoline sells for. So that's another way of revolutionizing the market.