General Motors Corp. will invest more than $500 million in the United States to build its next-generation compact car, the Chevy Cruze. The car is a key element of GM's strategy to build smaller, more fuel-efficient models to stoke sales and help restore profits amid sinking demand for its money-making big pickups and sport utility vehicles.
GM will pour $150 million into developing the Cruze and another $350 million into its factory here, where the car will be built. The plant is in the Mahoning Valley section of Ohio, an area hit hard by shuttered steel mills and economic uncertainty. On Thursday, when the automaker announced the investment and took the wraps off a foam model of the Cruze, throngs of workers, retirees, executives, dealers and politicians snapped photos of the car with their cell phones.