GEELY KC CONCEPT
He went back to Volvo, his spiritual home, to replace departing design director Steve Mattin and was just about ensconced there when Chinese-based Geely created big headlines at the end of 2009 by paying $1.8 billion (equivalent to £1.2bn then) to buy the Swedish company from Ford: “We knew they were going to buy it and it was obvious there would be changes at the top. Anyone who understood the rules of cricket was on their way out.”
However, more or less overnight, literally as Horbury was clearing his desk, Geely’s founder-owner Li Shufu announced his appointment to a new, overarching position as head of Geely Group design – responsible not only for Volvo but also for Geely, the Lynk&co brand that was soon to emerge and various other companies. It’s the position Horbury still holds.
“It ruffled some feathers,” he says. “It was clear they were going to have to get much more serious about design. There was a big saloon under way, but it was a bit of a smorgasbord of design ideas and we had to change a lot of things.”
The chairman’s idea was that the grille of this flagship car, the Geely KC Concept, should carry a complex pattern of concentric rings, representing a view into the expanding cosmos, developing a theme Volvo had used a couple of years earlier with its Concept Universe.
In the end, Geely launched a proud, graceful saloon concept at the 2013 Shanghai show. “It incorporated some of the intricate elements Chinese buyers enjoy,” says Horbury. “The chairman was delighted and the cosmos theme was carried into the next four Geely production cars, which sold out of their skins.”