The car manufacturing empire of General Motors includes Germany's Opel, Sweden's Saab, Australia's Holden and Korea's GM Daewoo. But the collapse of the empire has seen the money-losing brands Opel, Saab, Hummer and Saturn put up for sale. Leading carmakers like Toyota can't be bothered to look at these troubled assets, but up-and-coming Chinese carmakers see things quite differently.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald on Thursday, Li Shaozhu, the vice-president of Dongfeng Motor Corp., revealed an interest in Holden after leading Australian Trade Minister Simon Crean and Industry Minister Kim Carr on a tour of the company's factories in Wuhan. Dongfeng, China's third-largest carmaker, is said to have held talks with GM already. Australian officials strongly denied the report, saying they had no plans to sell the Australian automaker.

Chinese carmakers are eyeing Opel, Saab, Hummer and other GM brands. Beijing Automotive Industry Holding is competing with Canadian car parts maker Magna International to acquire Opel, and if that deal falls through it will acquire Saab, according to a recent report by the South China Morning Post. Meanwhile, Chinese automaker Geely has begun talks to buy Sweden's Volvo brand from Ford.

China's carmakers hope to acquire the brand value and advanced technologies of the Western brands and use them to build vehicles for the vast Chinese market. But experts say China is expected to face obstacles with advanced countries wary of technology leaking beyond their borders and protests by autoworkers who fear for their jobs. Experts also see the lack of management experience among the Chinese automakers as another possible obstacle.