General Motors history

By the time 1909 rolled around, General Motors had purchased a half interest in Oakland Motor Car Co.

In 1910, Durant lost control of the company to a banker’s trust as a result of the $15 million debt incurred through its acquisitions.

In 1911, Charles F. Kettering, with Henry M. Leland, of Dayton Engineering Laboratories Company (DELCO) invented and patented the first electric starter in America.

GM introduced the electric self-starter commercially in its 1912 Cadillac, and this invention soon made the hand crank obsolete.

General Motors began operating in South Africa in 1913 through its wholly owned subsidiary, General Motors South Africa and was a market that briefly had its own local brand, Ranger.

GM products are also currently sold by the company Yanase Co., Ltd. since 1915.

In 1916, GM was reincorporated in Detroit as General Motors Corporation and became a public company via an initial public offering.

In 1917, GM acquired Samson Tractor.

In 1918, GM acquired United Motors, a parts supplier founded by Durant and headed by Alfred P. Sloan, for $45 million.

GMAC had been founded in 1919 to finance and insure the installment sales of GM products and had later expanded into other businesses.

In 1920, du Pont orchestrated the removal of Durant once again and replaced him with Alfred P. Sloan.

In 1921, Thomas Midgley Jr., an engineer for GM, discovered tetraethyllead (leaded gasoline) as an antiknock agent and GM patented the compound because ethanol could not be patented.

The Yellow Truck & Coach Manufacturing Co. (now GMC Truck & Coach Division), organized in 1925, was among the new American divisions and subsidiaries established.

In 1926, the company introduced the Pontiac brand.

When this shop was sold in 1927, Earl secured a job as head of a new design division at General Motors.

In 1928, GM became the first car maker to manufacture cars in India.

The year 1929 also put GM in the pilot seat.

The firm prospered, however, and went on to purchase the internal combustion engine railcar builder Electro-Motive Corporation and its engine supplier, Winton Engine, in 1930.

In 1931 GM became the world’s largest manufacturer of motor vehicles.

In 1932, GM acquired Packard.

In 1933, GM acquired a controlling interest in North American Aviation and merged it with the General Aviation Manufacturing Corporation.

In 1935, at the age of 24, Bill Mitchell was recruited by Harley Earl to the design team at GM and the following year he was appointed as Chief Designer of Cadillac.

In 1937 Earl renamed what had been the Art and Color Section the Style Section.

In 1938, GM established Detroit Diesel.

In 1939, the company founded Motors Insurance Corporation and entered the vehicle insurance market.

By 1941 it was making 44 percent of all the cars in the United States and had become one of the largest industrial corporations in the world.

He also put the fins on Cadillacs in the era following World War II, styling the twin curvilinear taillights of the 1948 Cadillac after the twin-boomed tail of the P-38 Lightning, a fighter plane designed by Kelly Johnson.

In 1949, the company opened its own assembly plant and operated under the name Niger/Nigeria Motors.

Effective January 28, 1953, Charles Erwin Wilson, then GM president, was named by Dwight D. Eisenhower as United States Secretary of Defense.

In 1954, sales of fully imported Holden vehicles into New Zealand began.

By 1955, General Motors was the first company in America to make more than $1 billion in a single year.

In April 1956, Alfred P. Sloan retired as chairman and was succeeded by Albert Bradley.

After World War II, the local production of Chevrolet and Vauxhalls resumed followed by Pontiac in 1959.

In 1962, GM introduced the first turbo charged engine in the world for a car in the Oldsmobile Cutlass Turbo-Jetfire.

In 1965 the plant and its distribution network were split into different companies and renamed as Federated Motors Industries.

In 1966, GM released the Electrovan, the first hydrogen fuel cell car ever produced.

In 1971, in partnership with Boeing, GM's Delco Defense Electronics Division designed the Lunar Roving Vehicle, which traversed the surface of the Moon.

In 1972, GM produced the first rear wheel anti-lock braking system for two models: the Toronado and Eldorado.

GM demonstrated gas turbine vehicles powered by kerosene, an area of interest throughout the industry, but abandoned the alternative engine configuration due to the 1973 oil crisis.

In November 1974, Thomas Murphy became CEO of the company, succeeding Richard C. Gerstenberg.

Formed in 1975, General Motors East Africa (GMEA) was the largest assembler of commercial vehicles in the region exporting them from Kenya to East and Central African countries including Uganda, Tanzania, Malawi, Rwanda and Burundi.

In 1979, the company sold Frigidaire, which had between $450 million and $500 million in annual revenues but was losing money.

In 1982, GM formed Industries Mécaniques Maghrébines, which built a plant in Kairouan, Tunisia.

Since 1983, GM and Al-Monsour Automotive have owned General Motors Egypt, which is currently the only manufacturer of traditional GM branded vehicles in Egypt.

In 1984, GM acquired Electronic Data Systems from Ross Perot for $2.5 billion as part of a strategy by CEO Roger Smith to derive at least 10% of its annual worldwide revenue from nonautomotive sources.

In 1985, GM also acquired Hughes Aircraft Company for $5 billion in cash and stock and merged it into Delco Electronics.

The transaction made Ross Perot the largest shareholder of GM; however, disagreements with Roger Smith led the company to buy all shares held by Ross Perot for $750 million in 1986.

In 1987, in conjunction with AeroVironment, GM built the Sunraycer, which won the inaugural World Solar Challenge and was a showcase of advanced technology.

In 1988, GM acquired a 15% stake in AeroVironment.

In 1989, GM acquired half of Saab Automobile's car operations for $600 million.

In August 1990, Robert Stempel became CEO of the company, succeeding Roger Smith.

In 1991 the company was taken in by a joint venture between General Motors and UACN of Nigeria.

In November 1992, John F. Smith Jr. became CEO of the company.

In 1993, GM sold Lotus Cars to Bugatti.

GM New Zealand was renamed Holden New Zealand in 1994.

GM entered the market for the second time in 1996.

In 1997, GM sold the military businesses of Hughes Aircraft Company to Raytheon Company for $9.5 billion in stock and the assumption of debt.

The Shanghai GM plant was officially opened on December 15, 1998, when the first Chinese-built Buick came off the assembly line.

In February 2000, Rick Wagoner was named CEO, succeeding John F. Smith Jr.

In May 2004, GM delivered the first full-sized pickup truck hybrid vehicles, the 1/2-ton Chevrolet Silverado/GMC Sierra.

In 2005, after the partnership with Fiat resulted in a increasingly contentious dispute, GM paid $2 billion to sever its ties with Fiat.

In January 2006, GM introduced the 2006 Saturn Vue Green Line, a hybrid vehicle.

In late 2008, the world's largest rooftop solar power installation was installed at GM's manufacturing plant in Zaragoza.

The loans would allow the auto companies to continue operating through March 2009, by which time the plan required them to demonstrate “financial viability” or return the money within 30 days.

In May 2010, the company repaid a $6.7 billion loan from the government ahead of schedule.

In August 2011, GM announced plans to build a $150 million 190,300 square-foot plant in Bekasi, West Java, Indonesia, which would produce 40,000 passenger cars per year for the Southeast Asian market.

In 2012, PSA Group and General Motors formed an alliance and GM acquired 7% of PSA Group.

The plant opened on March 11, 2013.

On January 15, 2014, Mary Barra was named chief executive officer, succeeding Daniel Akerson.

In October 2015, the second-generation Volt was launched in the United States and Canada.

On January 4, 2016, GM invested $500 million in Lyft.

GM exited the South Africa market in 2017, selling its parts business to Isuzu.

In October 2018, Honda invested $2.75 billion in GM's self-driving car unit, including an initial investment of $275 million, followed by $2 billion within a year.

In March 2019, GM ceased production of the Chevrolet Volt.

On March 21, 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, General Motors began assisting Ventec Life Systems to produce ventilators.