Last year, GM generated 59 percent of its sales outside the United States. Chairman Rick Wagoner told shareholders recently that that percentage will grow, reflecting rapid growth in emerging markets such as China and Russia. The shift also reflects a steady decline in GM's share of the U.S. market. While GM's successes overseas cannot make up for its deep troubles at home, they provide encouraging evidence that the U.S. automaker is still a formidable force on a global basis. Although GM wasn't the first Detroit automaker to start building vehicles in China -- Chrysler was there long before -- GM's ambitious investment and shrewd choice of a venture partner turned it into one of the leaders in the Chinese market. In Russia, another booming market which is expected to become Europe's largest, GM's Chevrolet nameplate is the top-selling foreign brand this year. Executives point to wide-open markets like Chile -- which has no national industry and no tariffs, and offers a level playing field -- to show how GM can perform when it is not hindered by protectionist practices or saddled with legacy costs. 'I measure the success of a global portfolio by its success in Chile,' said Maureen Kempston Darkes, head of GM's Latin America, Africa and Middle East sales region. In Chile's highly competitive market, where U.S. brands go up against European, Chinese and even low-cost Indian nameplates, GM is the leader with 17 percent of the market.In its effort to compete in fast-growing emerging markets in Latin America, Asia and eastern Europe, GM relies heavily on its South Korean operations, built around the engineering assets of the defunct Daewoo group. Now called GM Daewoo Automotive & Technology, the outfit develops and produces small cars at a much lower cost than GM can at home. As part of a plan announced in 2005 to streamline its global operations, tap their strengths and reduce duplication, the Korean operations are responsible for the development of the architecture, or basic underpinnings, of all GM minicars and subcompacts, for all brands in all regions. Europe is responsible for mid-size cars, and the U.S. operations take the lead in developing the trucks. Production processes also have been standardized so that models based on the same architecture are all assembled the same way, whether they're built in Russia or South Africa. 'Now we produce globally competitive architecture on which a whole variety of entirely different cars can be built,' Lutz said. By harnessing all its far-flung resources, GM can produce more models for more regions, for less money. And that's essential as GM enters a second century. You can reach Christine Tierney at (313) 222-1463 or [email protected].