Laurence Hartnett - General Motors-Holden

General Motors-Holden

He was brought to Australia in 1934 by General Motors to head up its Australian subsidiary General Motors Holden (GMH), which it had acquired in 1931. At the time of his appointment as Managing Director, GMH was performing poorly, and Hartnett's brief was to either turn around the floundering business or close it down.

Hartnett made a personal effort to do this by improving relations with General Motors in the US, as well as local car dealers and company employees. Between the world wars the number of cars on Australian roads increased nearly five-fold from 116,658 in 1922 to 562,271 in 1938. Hartnett capitalised on this growth and successfully turned around the fortunes of the local subsidiary to the extent that in 1935, the company increased production to over 23,000 bodies, and declared a profit of 650,000 pounds.

In 1936, Hartnett instigated plans for production of an Australian car- these plans finally came to fruition in 1948, with the introduction of the Holden.