Daewoo Motors was a South Korean automotive company a part of the Daewoo Group, established in 1982. It sold most of its assets in 2001 to General Motors, after running into financial trouble, becoming a subsidiary of the American company and in 2011, it was replaced by GM Korea. The company was first established as National Motor in 1937. The name was changed to Saenara Motor in November 1962. Saenara was assembling and selling the Datsun Bluebird PL310. The first automobile company in Korea, Saenara was equipped with modern assembly facilities, and was established after the Automobile Industry Promotion Policy was announced by the South Korean government in 1962. Saenara Motor was then bought by Shinjin Industrial in 1965, which changed its name to Shinjin Motors after establishing collaborations with Toyota.
The first Daewoo addition was the 1986 Daewoo LeMans, based on the Opel Kadett E. Its three-door versions were called the Racer and the five-door version were called Penta-5. This car had an international ambition for GM, as it was sold almost worldwide, as the Pontiac LeMans, Asüna GT and SE, or Passport Optima. This car was produced until February 1997, being one of Daewoo Motor's greatest successes. In 1986, Daewoo also offered a badge-engineered version of the Nissan Vanette. In 1990, they created the Espero, designed by Bertone, initiating a tradition at Daewoo Motor of models created by Italian designers. Daewoo Heavy Industries (DHI) introduced in 1991, the Tico mini car, which was sold at Daewoo Motor's dealers.
In 1992, the joint-venture with General Motors ended, leaving Daewoo Motor as an independent company. In 1994, Daewoo started importing the second generation Honda Legend to replace the discontinued flagship Imperial, under the name of Arcadia. This year, the LeMans also got a slight refresh, and all variants (three, four and five-door) were then sold under the Cielo model name. In 1998 one of Daewoo's best known cars was introduced, the Matiz. The design was again signed by Giorgetto Giugiaro and based on his 1992 "Lucciola" concept car, which was initially imagined as a replacement for the Fiat Cinquecento. This car became Daewoo Motor's best-seller for the next four years.
Daewoo owned a share of AvtoZAZ, an automobile manufacturer based in Ukraine, from 1998 to 2003, establishing the AvtoZAZ-Daewoo joint venture. The CKD assembly of the Daewoo Lanos started in 2002 in Ukraine and later it was adopted for full-scale production as the ZAZ Lanos. A version of the Daewoo-developed Chevrolet Aveo has been assembled for local market at the Chornomorsk subsidiary. In August 1992, Daewoo set up Uz-DaewooAuto, a joint venture in Asaka, Uzbekistan, leveraging the presence of a large local ethnic Korean minority. Currently, the plant assembles the Matiz and the Nexia for both the local market and export, as well as the Lacetti hatchback and sedan for the domestic market only.
