Geely Stealy – Why the Geely GE is a massive step back
When I was a child my dad returned home from a trip to China with a fake Rolex which he gave me as a birthday present. I was amazed at how close it looked to his real Rolex. Naively I asked if the Chinese can copy a Rolex, why don’t they copy the Rolls Royce? My father assured me that it would be much more difficult to steal the design for a Rolls Royce and actually manufacture the car. He was wrong.
At the Auto Shanghai 2009 Geely launched the Geely Excellence, or GE for short. Geely directly stole the design of the Rolls Royce Phantom down to Emily, the Flying Lady hood ornament. Everything about the car is an example of the shoddy Chinese copy-wrong mentality, and is truely an ebarrasment to all Chinese automakers. Even the name of the car: GE, is a direct violation of international trademark law since GE is a famous trademark owned by General Electric.
On the outside it is obvious that car is made of fiberglass. To the average person the shiny polish and metalic paint job make the car look very slick, but to the professional the car is nothing more than an example of lack of craftsmanship. When you look closely you will notice waves and defects in the surface that most car makers would be embarrased to display, even in a concept car.
The inside of the car is truly laughable. The maroon red shag carpeting
looks like it came straight out of a 1960′s set for an Austin Powers’ movie. Geely replaced the two bucket seats from the Phantom with a single thrown for a ‘VIP’. I can just see Dr. Evil riding in the back with Mini-Me riding shotgun in the front. Gone are the days of ferrying your guest around while sitting next to each other in the lap of luxury. I guess Geely’s idea is to put the wife in the trunk!
It will be interesting to see how Rolls Royce reacts. GM made the mistake of not taking Chery to task when Chery stole the designs for the QQ. Will Rolls Royce follow suit? I talked with a representative from Rolls Royce. They used words like “Shameful” and “Embarrassing (to China)” to describe the car. They said their executives went over to Geely when they heard about the car just to say hello, but in true Stealy fashion no executives from Geely dared come out to stand up and talk with them. Perhaps such an embarrassing example of stolen design will finally force Chinese courts to recognize trade dress and put an end to China’s counterfeight culture.
The truly embarassing thing is that Li ShuFu, the CEO of Geely would give the ‘Okay’ to display this vehicle. Geely has great engineers and makes good quality cars which should not be blemished by this new ‘Stealy’ icon. This car will do nothing but embarass Geely in the international market and strengthen the international stereotype that the only thing Chinese know how to do is copy, which is not true, putting aside Geely.
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Clap Clap Clap for Ash. Thank you for writing this.
Geely thought it was fun to do this and now they will have to deal with the media backlash.
It wasnt me. I made a mistake, the article was written by Charlie, an American who has been working in the PRC car industry for several years.
Great piece. As much as I want Geely to succeed, I hope an example is made of them for this national embarrassment. Out of all the unique and attractive designs shown at Shanghai this year, this now is the only thing Western media is focused on. Way to f*cking go, Geely…
Well, Rolls-Royce is threatening to sue Geely, but this lawsuit will go nowhere judging by how the previous BMW/Daimler joint lawsuit against Shuanghuan went in Italian court.
Basically, an imitation like Geely GE is legal even in Europe, as long as consumers could distinguish the imitation product from the original original. In other word, Chinese automakers “evolved” from doing straight replicas(like Chery QQ whose door could be fit on a Matiz)to doing imitation products that aren’t exactly like the originals.
Nonetheless, what Chery, Geely, and BYD are doing is damaging their own brand with all these endless piracy/imitation controversies, so they need to stop doing this if they actually are thinking about becoming credible brands in the US and EU markets.
“The truly embarassing thing is that Li ShuFu, the CEO of Geely would give the ‘Okay’ to display this vehicle.”
Remember the Fengyin Batmobile? In 2007 I think Chairman Li got so much negative feedback about the monstrosity that he gave up showing it, or anything else, at the Beijing show. But hubris got the best of him, and so he put it on display up the road at the Geely University campus.
CONGRATS for posting this Ash!!
Even if it wasn’t you who wrote this, it’s still a good sign against this ill common practice of copying products in China..
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you have known me for quite a long time already Ash, and you know this is exactly what I have always stated!!
“This car will do nothing but embarass Geely in the international market and strengthen the international stereotype that the only thing Chinese know how to do is copy”
Couldn’t have said better!!
This is what has to stop in China!!!
Unfortunately there is still people who makes statements like “why buy the original if I can get this for half of the price” (see post about the Hove H5).
This practice only makes everything worse, destroys intellectual property and wastes several hundred millions dollars of R&D and marketing from other automakers.
Than, they get suited, people don’t understand why and they stand by the side of the “poor” chinese brands who are facing the “unfair” threats of “evil foreign corporations“…
pathetic!!
well, congratulations to Charlie for writing it, then! =)
regarding the lawsuit against Geely, I’ve posted this on other topic, but it’s worth posting again:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/5205369/Rolls-Royce-considers-legal-action-against-30000-Chinese-copycat.html
wtf is this crap article anyway??! I don’t see any similarities between the 2, this guy is a JERK, he’s even picking on the tiny details. Geely GE, Oh, the name is a copy too! what a stupid thing to say! They are two completely different companies, and GE is a name of a company, not a product, besides, things like these happen even with big international brands. These 2 are VASTLY different cars, and that guy has no right to bash it just because it’s Chinese.
hahahahaha, I can only assume Ed is Geelys CEO….
oh come on Ed, there is no need for denial. Geely did it, well way before the actual car was unveiled in the auto show, many people already call it a clone.
@Jackson Liu
I doubt Li Shu Fu can speak or write that good English lol.
But I always feel like asking this question though
What does RR think about Chrysler 300C ?
It’ll take a few years to get it out of their system. With the way news propagates through the internet these days, it seems we’re bombarded with many instances of clones, but the actual passage of time is very little. Just think back to Geely’s days of the Beauty Leopard and crap like that compared to what it is today. Sure, they’re still making clones, but the overall amount of clones have decreased and their own concepts have improved significantly in only two years. The internet makes the short passage of time seem long, but they’ve learned a lot in a very short time. All this negative publicity will help them get over it I’m sure. Especially when the domestic audience is relatively critical of these laughable efforts.
ed is a moron.
As if Geely care about what’s being said in the Western world.
Short of nuking the country, there is absolutely nothing anyone can do about it.
‘Legal action’…Oh please, they must be wetting their pants with laughter at the threat.
Surely it’s meant for the country mouse bumpkin “lao bai xing” that has a few hundred grand in his straw mattress and wants to impress his fellow hicks…or at least the township party secretary.
Truly a sad statement about Chinese “know how” and ingenuity.
I was listening to a Beijing-based radio station last week and the GE was mentioned at length during their coverage of the Shanghai show. What was a bit of a surprise to me was that the hosts were very critical of Geely and called them out for copying RR with the car, and for copying Bentley with the “Riich” logo.
The hosts also made the point that Geely and other domestic makers have made great strides in the design and technology used in their cars and should no longer be considered 2nd-tier to the JV brands (not sure I agree with this, btw). However, with the GE Geely has undermined all of this by sending the message that they’re good at copying/stealing rather than innovating.