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Asuna
Fate Merged into Chevrolet
Founded 1992
Defunct 1994
Industry Automobile
Products Compact cars
Parent General Motors (Chevrolet division)

Asüna was a captive import automobile brand created in 1992 for the Canadian market by General Motors as a counterpart to Geo. It was one of two successors to the Passport brand, which had a similar intent.

GM asuna timeline

Timeline of Passport, GEO and Asüna in Canada

Preceding the Asüna brand, Passport sold a Korean (Daewoo) made badge engineered Opel Kadett E known as the Passport Optima (which hit Canadian shores in 1988) as well as a selection of Isuzu SUVs. General Motors Canada changed its branding strategy in 1991, disbanding Passport (the Optima was rebadged as Pontiac LeMans). Isuzu was grouped together with Saab and GM's new, import-fighting Saturn division to form Saturn-Saab-Isuzu dealerships. The Geo brand was introduced in Canada in (model year) 1992, offered at Chevrolet-Oldsmobile-Cadillac dealers (who had been selling the Geo brand's products as Chevrolets from 1989 until the brand's introduction). Sales of Geo vehicles were relatively successful, prompting Pontiac-Buick-GMC dealers to request GM Canada to provide a lineup of similar "import" vehicles. Asüna was created to fulfill this demand.

The Pontiac LeMans model name was dropped altogether in favour of trimline designations, selling as Asüna SE in base trim hatchbacks and sedans, and as Asüna GT as a higher trim hatchback. The Asüna lineup was rounded out by the Sunfire (a rebadged Isuzu Impulse) and Sunrunner (a rebadged Suzuki Sidekick, taking the GMC Tracker's place in the Pontiac-Buick-GMC lineup).

Asüna sales could not match Geo's, and the Asüna brand was eliminated in 1995. The SE/GT and Sunfire were dropped from the GM Canada lineup and Sunrunner was later rebadged as a Pontiac.

List of vehicles[]

Name Years in production Badge engineered Image
Sunfire 1993 Isuzu Impulse Asuna sunfire
Sunrunner 1992–1993 Suzuki Escudo Asuna Sunrunner front
SE/GT 1993 Daewoo LeMans Asuna GT

References[]

Smallwikipedialogo This page uses some content from Wikipedia. The original article was at Asüna. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with Tractor & Construction Plant Wiki, the text of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons by Attribution License and/or GNU Free Documentation License. Please check page history for when the original article was copied to Wikia


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