The newly appointed Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the U.S. auto maker General Motors (GM) paid a visit to its subsidiary in Germany Opel and renewed GM's commitment to the struggling subsidiary.

In her first overseas trip as the CEO of GM, Mary Barra, joined by GM's new President, Dan Ammann, visited the Opel headquarters in the German town Ruesselheim. "I thought it was very important to reinforce in person GM's commitment to Opel, its importance to the company and the need to accelerate our progress going forward," she said.

Barra repeated that GM is investing 4 billion euros (5.47 billion U.S. dollars) in Germany and Europe through 2016 and will bring 23 new products and 13 new engines to market.

"I'm confident that we can achieve our goal to break-even in Europe by mid-decade," she said.

Opel announced in November that it had reached a preliminary agreement with workers to close a factory in Bochum, Germany, at the end of 2014. The move was considered as an effort made by GM to cut the losses in Europe. Opel managed to cut its third-quarter operating loss to 147 million euros in 2013.

Founded by Adam Opel in Ruesselsheim in 1862, Opel is one of Europe's largest auto makers and GM's second largest passenger car brand and the third biggest in Europe, an introduction on Opel's website said.