GM Chief Full-Size Pickup Engineer Already Hard at Work
2015 GMC Sierra HD All Terrain
Photo: © General Motors
The next-generation Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra are still quite a long way off. By most accounts, we likely won’t see GM’s next breed of full-size pickups until 2018 or 2019, but that doesn’t mean that they are not already well into development.
Recently, Automotive News shone the spotlight on Sheri Hickok, who was named to the position of GM’s chief engineer for full-size pickups in December. As it happens, Hickok is already scrutinizing clay models and determining which materials will go into the Silverado and Sierra in order to make them lighter and more efficient. If Ford’s gamble with the F-150 pays off, it’s a fair bet that it will rely heavily on aluminum.
Hickok wouldn’t say much specifically about the process leading up to a new Silverado and Sierra, going so far as to not mention the state where her team will conduct focus groups. She did, however, say that she was going to need a pair of cowboy boots. So it’s probably Texas, ya know.
“I’m not a traditional truck driver, so to me that process will be really powerful,” she said. “The guy who owns the construction business, what does he need out of his truck? It’s probably going to be something very different from what I would want. We need to channel the customer the whole time.”
Clearly, her head is in the right place. It would seem that, in Hickok’s hands, the future of GM’s full-size pickup trucks is secure.
News Source: Automotive News (subscription required)
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