Holden's conceptual turn

HOLDEN chairman and managing director Denny Mooney has defended his decision to end a string of headline-grabbing reveals and not to show a concept vehicle at this month’s Melbourne International Motor Show.

It is understood that a show car was in development before being knocked back.

"I don’t know that we want to do a special show car at every show (because) it doesn’t become special any more – it becomes the norm," Mr Mooney said.

"I don’t want it to be just kind of normal business. When we show a unique show car, it’ll be unique and it’ll make a lot of news. It’ll have meaning behind it – it won’t just be an exercise.

"It’s not just cost ... it’s your technical resources that get diverted from working on mainstream programs to work on show cars – the designers, the sculptors, and even our engineers that get involved in some of the projects that we work on. It diverts your resources from doing the mainstream stuff that you’ve got to get done. That’s always part of the trade-off." Having said that, Mr Mooney hinted that a show car would materialise at the Australian International Motor Show in Sydney later in the year.