The last HSV doesn't spell the end of its performance cars

The last HSV built has left the production line in Melbourne this week.

A Holden Colorado SportsCat by HSV (an SV in Summit White to be specific) marks the end Walkinshaw-led company tuning and modifying Holdens.

But while the facility at Clayton in Melbourne’s outer suburbs is currently focused on converting the newly (locally) launched Silverado 1500, a spokesperson told MOTOR the future of the company isn’t just the conversion of American pick-ups.

“With SportsCat being the last to wear an HSV badge, we'll continue to investigate exciting products and bring them to market.”

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Holden will effectively cease to exist on the new car market by the end of the year, so the ‘H’ in HSV would become an oddity, though the anticipated change for the brand to become ‘GMSV’ won’t limit the company to converting utility vehicles to right-hook.

Though MOTOR is unable to confirm under which brand or what form the continued enthusiast offerings from the Walkinshaw Group will take, a spokesperson was able to put our fast-car-hungry minds at ease.

“We will continue to evaluate performance vehicles and vehicle enhancements for the Australian market in the future,” they told MOTOR.

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While the SportsCat was the last car to leave the production line with HSV’s badge on the grille for the foreseeable future, there was no confirmation either way as to whether the HSV badge would ever return in other ways.

2017 HSV GTSR final drive

One potential avenue for HSV is a program like that run by Mazda for the NA MX-5 or Jaguar its classic models, in which the brand would ‘remanufacture’ previous models to as-new standards.

An example could be the restoration of a customer-owned cars, or a series of reproduction parts for popular models. Whether HSV takes this route in future is yet to be confirmed, but the potential is certainly there.