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23 AutoData | March 2019 By Leandro Alves and Márcio Stéfani Crhistian Castanho Did the diagnosis come from the head- quarters, which gave the mission of sol- ving the problems, or did you present to your bosses a plan to reverse that situ- ation? GM is very disciplined in the way it deci- des investments around theworld. For the leadership in theMercosur it was evident that if we didn’t have good reasons to continue investing in Brazil, it would be difficult to obtain the endorsement from the headquarters. So, we had to face the challenges tomakeviable a newpossible cycle in Brazil and this timewe decided to expose all the problems to our partners sowe could do it together. The objective was to find an equation so that, after all, the investment remunerated capital. Was the conversations result positive? Very positive. We have made great pro- gress. And I would like to highlight a few points about that. I always knew that the dealerswould bewith us. And that’swhat happened: they understood the situation and supported us.With the unions, what I sawduring the talkswas a great maturity. It was a clear and honest relationship.We shared our points, they also expressed their questions and we quickly came to an understanding. I was surprised by the response from the suppliers. We had a meeting with the CEOs of 67 suppliers. And we realized that all of us have very similar problems. In fact, many left Brazil thinking about doing the same in their companies. Will those negotiations be enough to en- sure the investments in Brazil? I see progress in all areas and I am con- fident. This is the plan. If negotiations are successful, GMwillmake the investment, R$ 10 billion until 2024. Even the conversations with the gover- nment of the State of Sao Paulo were productive? We are also moving forward and I am confidentwewill have a positive outcome. Of all the negotiations themost difficult is the one regarding the suppliers because we are talking tomany companies at the same time. Is there any possibility of a regression? I don’t think so. Everyone understood a very important thing. By entering into an agreement you really convert a re- lationship that is good into a long-term partnership. In that deal we are working on, we are talking about maintaining the fixed price for a long time and we will work hard to generate efficiency together. “Only in investment programs that have already been announced, Mexico would be able to export 750 thousand units to Brazil in 2021 with the free trade. If it accelerates until 2024, that volume can exceed 1 million units.”

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