Opel to Make Corsa with PSA Group

Opel will use French PSA Group’s technology in the next generation of its Corsa subcompact car, a company spokesman said, confirming a newspaper report.

The current Corsa is built with technology from General Motors, which has agreed to sell Opel and UK sister brand Vauxhall to PSA.

Opel had previously said its new Corsa, slated to be launched in 2019, would also be built with GM technology but has now decided to use PSA technology to earn higher margins, the German paper Allgemeine Zeitung Mainz reported in its online edition on May 2.

PSA, which agreed to buy Opel in March, was not available for comment, the paper said.

The new Corsa will be Opel’s fourth joint project with PSA after Opel models Crossland X, Grandland X and Combo.

The Corsa will be built at Opel’s largest manufacturing site, in Zaragoza, Spain.

The Corsa was Opel’s top-selling model last year with 263,416 units sold in Europe, down 1.9%, according to JATO Dynamics market researchers. It was the region’s fourth best-selling subcompact after Renault Clio, Volkswagen Polo and Ford Fiesta.

PSA Group’s announcement in February that they had purchased the Opel/Vauxhall brands from General Motors opens those brands to the Iranian market.

The Iranian market still has limited exposure to the European brand, and this could mean an entirely new firm entering with force with the backing of Peugeot, which now claims Iran as it second largest market.  

As part of the 2016 joint venture signed between Iran Khodro Company (IKCO) and PSA’s Peugeot, the French firm invested €400 million ($436 million at the time) in the venture called IKAP. PSA later signed another deal with SAIPA to produce Citroen-branded vehicles, including the Citroen C4 sedan due later this year.

Now with the GM selloff of German-based Opel and British-based Vauxhall, PSA would apparently have the second combined largest market share in Europe.

Currently, imports of Opel models to Iran is through a third-party known as Tavan Khodro Jey, which imports  limited numbers of Opels like Corsa and Astra models.

A limited range of Opel Corsas and Astras entered the local market in recent years with prices ranging from 90 million to 200 million rials (€22,500-€50,000)