The Auto Writer

High gas prices has the automotive industry reeling, looking for a fix that can be done quickly and cheaply. Of course, the risk remains that some decisions will be made rashly, bringing cars to the market that no one wants.

In General Motors’ case, the company is trailing Ford which has already committed to bringing the next generation Fiesta to the US market in 2010. Chevrolet will have the Volt, but with an expected MSRP around $38,000, it isn’t the mass produced econocar that many Americans want. The next generation Cobalt may do as could the imported Aveo, but neither car meets the criteria of many drivers — small, cheap, and of decent quality.

You may not be a fan of Kia, but like Honda and Volkswagen, the company is seeing a sales increase for the year and for one good reason: their fleets are dominated by small, fuel efficient cars, something GM desperately needs in their fleet.

GM’s sheer size reveals something few other manufacturers can claim — despite difficulties on the home front, GM is doing quite well internationally. It is this same international market that has a bevy of small cars in the GM quiver, vehicles that are not finding their way to America.

One example of this is the Beat concept, a minicar that GM says will be built in China, but not brought stateside, until now. If you believe the recent rumors flying around the automotive world, that is.

According to MarketWatch and others, the 1.2L I4 powered minicar will be sold in the US in addition to Asian and  Latin American markets that it was first built for. Apparently, GM knows that the trend going forward is to sell cars getting high fuel mileage no matter whether they’re a hybrid, diesel, or powered by a gasoline engine. The Beat, if it goes into production, should deliver about 40 mpg on the highway.