The Opel Meriva, imported into Malta by United Automobile Ltd, has achieved the lowest defect rate in the TÜV report 2007. Introduced in 2003 and now tested for the first time, the mpv immediately established itself as the top performer in this quality check. Faults were only found in 1.8 per cent of the bestselling Opel Merivas that were checked, while the industry average was 5.9 per cent.

“Our comprehensive quality initiative is clearly paying off,” said Opel managing director Hans H. Demant. “There is hardly a better indicator than this success achieved by one of our newest models. And the overall results for the Opel model range show that we are on the right track.”

Compared to last year’s results, almost all of Opel’s models improved significantly in the TÜV report 2007, both in the rankings as well as the defect rate percentages. In addition to the Meriva, the Corsa, Vectra, Agila and Astra are all better positioned than the industry average. This puts all the models in the low defect rate category.

The Meriva’s victory is even more significant considering that a model rarely achieves a defect rate of less than two per cent, and the next placed competitors scored well over this figure.

The significant progress shown in the TÜV 2007 report is the result of General Motors’ global quality initiative. The important aspects of GM’s integrated quality philosophy are standardised development and manufacturing processes. Five principles are applied in all plants: people involvement, standardisation, built-in-quality, short lead time and continuous improvement.

In the light of suppliers’ growing role in the manufacturing of cars, supplier quality is becoming more and more important. General Motors Europe supports suppliers with a team of more than 100 specialist engineers that works solely on preventing or solving possible quality problems of partners at their source.

“The spotlight on quality continues to intensify and expand. To only focus on production quality would not be enough,” says Peter G. Dersley, GME Vice President responsible for quality.

The range of Opel cars can be viewed at the showroom of United Automobile Ltd, part of United Group, at Abate Rigord Street, Ta’ Xbiex. Further information is available by calling 2132-0560.