Consider the following:
- Opel may end up part of a US/Canadian/Russian consortium
- Volvo may well end up in Beijing
- Porsche are going to need a bailout by Qatar
- Saturn lives in name only.
- Hummer has gone to an unknown machinery firm in China.
- Many of Chrysler’s nameplates will disappear.
- Pontiac is flat out dead (the last sign of life, the Vibe, was snuffed out today).
….and there’s probably more that I can’t think of as I write this.
Out of all the car companies being affected by the Carpocalypse (copyright, Jalopnik), could Saab be considered the biggest beneficiary?
It was a good article at Examiner.com that prompted this question.
……if Koenigsegg injects some of its own remarkable automotive insight and engineering prowess into Saab, then I truly believe we will see one of the greatest resurgences of intelligent and progressive automobile manufacturing of the 21st century.
I agree.
Of course, the big IF there is largely dependent upon Saab’s ability to turn their sales around with new models, and the Koenigsegg Group’s ability to invest in developing all-new models, particularly a new 9-3, in the future.
Saab grew an awesome reputation from the 60′s through the early 90′s, only to lose it to a large degree in the last 15 years (despite what were still some pretty good cars).
It’s not often that a company goes through that and had a chance to genuinely return to it’s geographical and technological roots.
Saab could well be the biggest automotive winner in this current crisis.
Related posts:
That Opel blurb...
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carpocalyps now and carmageddon are two old games on mac os 9.
midsommar greetings from sunny scania (typed on my ipod)
To all you swedes : Have a good one….skål
Saturn could help Saab in North America because Penske will be able to import cars to sell and service at SaturnUS 350 network of dealers, though he is still working on whether to include Canada’s Saturn dealers. Could fill in the geographic dealer holes in U.S. – maybe absorb the Saab franchises from those Cadillac-Hummer dealers?
Penske may not require badged Saturns. One never knows what this race car legend will do once he is the biggest auto dealer in the U.S.
MARK PHELAN of Detroit Free Press asks today:
“Got advice for Roger Penske?”
But, a great list of questions, like:
“Which foreign automakers can supply Saturn’s new model line? Peugeot-Citroen has a wide range of fuel-efficient models and a long-standing desire to get back into the U.S. market….”
http://www.sacbee.com/846/story/1960457.html
(have no idea why an article from the Detroit Free Press is posted first at the Sacramento CA Bee)
Sorry Swade, I think VW will be the biggest winner. Doesn’t mean that Saab cannot get past 200,000 vehicles/year by 2011 if they get the engines right.
I still predict Mitsubishi will exit autos by 2011.
more on Saab in Canada at:
http://www.financialpost.com/story.html?id=1702915
“Saab seeks sporty salvation
Swedish maker of luxury cars buys GM brand”
Nicholas Van Praet, Financial Post
Published: Wednesday, June 17, 2009
“…”It’s easy to look at a car company and say ‘They don’t have a hope in hell.’ But I totally disagree,” said Chris Budd, whose family owns Budd’s Saturn Saab in Oakville, Ont. “Any company can be turned around with the right direction and the right thought process.”
The key issue for Saab’s 24 Canadian dealers is how their retail businesses will be reorganized. All Saab dealers in Canada are twinned with one of GM’s 51 Saturn stores and many retailers sell both under one roof. However, GM is selling each brand to separate bidders and it is unclear how the retail networks will be worked out. Saturn is being sold to Penske Automotive Group, which is doing due diligence on the transaction.
Mr. Budd, who sat on the committee of U. S. dealers that looked at spinning off Saturn and is also a member of the international council for Saab, said Canada’s Saturn-Saab dealers are generally pushing for the two brands to remain joined. “It would be the simplest way to solve this.” …
Hope Chris Budd is on JAJ’s list of people to call!
Saab has a bigger possible upside out of this than anyone else. Whether they can execute on the opportunity is another question.
The Saturn situation is certainly intriguing — there is some owner loyalty and a reputation for a good consumer experience. If they can match that to some decent cars, a positive outcome is a possibility.
Saab has the opportunity to be the automotive Apple. Just got to get the products right and keep the finances in order. The zeitgiest is surely in tune with Saabs natural attributes?
Note to JAJ, CvK & BE:
Michelle Obama’s last words to Barack before his innauguration speech:
” Don’t blow it buddy.”.
SAAB has to be up there. This is the perfect storm now that Koenigsegg has been identified as the buyer. SAAB gets away from GM, much of the cost of purchased was financed by GM, Koenigsegg has expertise to complement SAAB’s and let’s face it…expectations for non-SAAB enthusiats are very low.
In the next five years SAAB will come out nowhere to most. That is, everyone except SAAB enthusiats. We knew it was possible all along depending on the buyer
What a difference a year makes!
Having not seen any newer interiors and judging only on past models, K-Saabs first order of business should be to upgrade materials and get infotainment up-to-snuff. $50-200 a car is reasonable. You aint gonna be chasing Audi and the others with POS Pontiac styling cues.
Mechanically, the cars are pretty competitive IMO. How much tweaking can be wrung out of the current chassis and ReAxs? Probably not much, but theres certainly no need to reinvent the wheel. An electric rear-drive to silently glide around town would be sweet. And maybe find a way around the five-plus hour water pump on the 2.0 SSs.
All in all, Saab is looking better than ever IMEBO.
paradigm changes indeed. K-egg+Saab deal (Quant)sparked Mark Spinelli at popsci.com to speculate on :”For years, automotive futurists have been waiting on an industry meltdown to re-configure the auto industry. Could Sweden become ground zero? …
…Nonetheless, the pairup could spark the arrival of new business plans using a combination of government investment and cast-off parts of shrinking automakers. Proponents of a new auto industry say by unbundling the giants and incorporating their components into more efficient niche players, new, smaller entities could serve narrower customer groups. The result could be lower prices, better customer service and a wider variety of products….”
That point had URL link to this analysis by some Booz, Allen consultants (a consultancy usually skewed to technology issues):
“Changing Channels In The Automotive Industry: The Future of Automotive Marketing and Distribution”
http://www.strategy-business.com/press/16635507/10102
well, that’s all/enough for today, though I do hope there is serious K-Saab energy being applied to the distribution issues.
Saturn has got to be the biggest winner, for no other reason than Penske’s track record (no pun intended).
I think Saab definitely got the best end of this shake-up. The publicity and hype that is surrounding such a partnership is endless. And now the public is awaiting to see what Saab & Koenigsegg will do with this new lease on life for the Saab brand. If they churn out something like an Sport/hatch hybrid that people actually would want to drive and make it affordable. Then this could catapult Saab right to the top of things. I think Fiat screwed up, they should have gone after Saturn and used the distribution channel for it’s many other brands.
We have JAJ and his management team to thank for getting Saab detached from GM at the earliest possible opportunity by ‘reconstructing’ Saab back on 20Feb as GM festered under billions of debt.
All I can hope is that CvK et al sign on the dotted line asap and get Saab back on track. I have said this before but Saab needs to get its ‘quirkiness’ back and judging by what we see in the CCX I just think it might succeed.
Happy Midsommar to all (even if it is winter where you are)
Saab is incredibly risky (look at sales) and K-Segg small and inexperienced. If it works, the upside is huge. I’m not rooting against Saab but a lot of things will have to go right. We also don’t know how much K-Segg is putting into this and whether Maud O will support loans without significant investment.
Saturn and Opel are winners.
Wouldn’t call Opel winners having fallen pray to Russian oligarchs.
Saturn as a brand is dead, too – nice distribution channel, zero brand equity.
considering the breaking story that Russian courts have confiscated Telenor’s stake in Vimpelcom in Saturday NYT, I’d agree with Kroum that Russian oligarchs are not perceived as stable business partners these days. (Norway not yet at war with Russia). Opel deal was already fragile.
As to Saturn’s brand equity – hard to assess. Distribution often rules over brand or superior product in the U.S.
Calling on Norwegians – is it true that Norway was considering banning all gasoline powered new vehicle sales by 2012?
This article about Eker gets into Norway’s position with electric cars and:
“… Ekere responded that SV’s national convention in our party decided that would prohibit the sale of new petrol cars by 2012. In the interview in Ukeavisen Management Ekere asked who would establish the infrastructure that was needed for more environmentally friendly cars and who would produce the new types of car. . He thought it was a good idea that the government bought Volvo and Saab, and developed new car with these plants as a basis. http://www.orapp.no/kommentarer/20090619/risikotaker-med-bildilla/
ah, no news here about the mysterious rich Americans in K-egg Group.
more on: show me the money, (thanks to google trans!)
from http://www.bilnorge.no/artikkel.php?aid=34155
by Jon Winding-Sørensen 19/06-2009 10:49
“…And even if the accounts which are very small transparent (consolidated into the GM system, and before GM entered, it was mixed together with Scania huge surplus), but there is no protest as loud when it is alleged that Saab has earned money in only one year of his entire history.
But now must be Königsegg-sphere, with no obvious means, over Saab in which debt is at least 2.5 billion [SEK], where the requirements in connection with salary guarantees and the like soon is over 300 million [SEK], and where they currently burn about 200 million [SEK] each month. [remaining debt is and salary guarantees being paid by Sweden are now over 600MILUSD, and the monthly burn rate is about 25MILUSD per month]
Upside is a possible loan of 600 million dollars in the European Investment Bank – but then the Swedish population initially convinced that it is wise to risk tax money on a state guarantee.
Magi?
It may be that it goes, Bård Ekere have been to many exciting things before.
After he went to the wide side Königsegg actually with an operating profit of approx. 1 million last year (it is an operating margin of approx. 1 per cent), but representatives of the Swedish tax being sounded more realistic than super optimistic GM, Opel, Saab chief Jan-Åke Jonsson, Saab stops union, council of Ängelholm – among many others.
By sacrificing the negotiations said Thursday that the State no to chord, on the grounds that they lack concrete information about all the money it now spoken about.
At chords went so smoothly through anyway due NOK most at GM-owned ca. 80 percent of this debt, and that they are pretty desperate to get rid of all the distracting obligations midt inside their own restructuring.
Those of us who are happy in the Saab, and who want the car back – but in a completely different form than what GM has degenerated to – can not do other than hope.”
NOTE: VW ads for the Passat and Tiguan, and ads for Ford accompany this article about Eker and money.
I think at this point for what we know about the way that GM cooked the books when dealing with Saab’s profitability or “lack thereof” as most news media like to put it. It’s very unfair to assess how much, when and what years they have actually lost money for GM. It’s awfully strange how a company that has done nothing but lost GM money in the 20 yrs (minus the 1 yr of profitability)that they’ve been owners of the brand. How forgiving of debt and freedom orientated they are with helping Saab along in this process. Even more so than they have been with Opel on the other hand. Just seems to me like the conscious of a guilty party that knows they have willingly and continually shafted another(Saab)for their own gain!
I think as far as Saturn goes. They are the most hanging out on a limb so to speak. Nothing is even certain about where they plan on getting new product from. So I can’t see how their future is as bright and rosy.
Lately i really have come to enjoy your passionate site about the troublesome car brand we all love. Im swedish and ive been sitting in my fathers cars since a child, 96,99,900,9000 and i got to drive my father’s “im a economy driver” 9’5 aero before he got senile and traded it for a peguot 308. I would have liked to drive it alot more but he got scared first time when he realised he bought a turbo monster and i never asked again to let me drive him around. Im not sure i got it right, but are you Australian? If you are i like you even more. Nowdays i drive around in a -96 9000 low preasure turbo. Since im a poor guy living on my health insurance at the moment that car is probably the most modern saab i’ll ever drive, lol.
But that doesent matter, all that matters is that when im a old man i can can buy a saab or atlest wish i could. Maby my next saab is a saab 90;) i was offered to buy one that only had 50 000km on it and only driven in the summer very cheap some years ago. But i was stupid enough to say no becouse its ugly. Bad judgement.
This konigsegg deal is almost surreal to me. It could possible become crap or the coolest thing in the history of saab ever. I watched an interview whith the norwegian investor and he was wery secret whit the deal and especialy about the american investor that aparently you cant find even on google image search. Its all a mystery but its very exiting, isnt it?:) Saab has almost never been a profitable company, but still here it is. That was what i was thinking when GM went belly down to comfort myself. But it seems the story will continue -and i like it! Even though there will never be a saab 90 ever again and i will have to be satisfyed with my old 9000.
Saab ist the winner. There is a good chance the cars developped in future by K-Saab will be great vehicles. I think the most importan thing now is beeing prepared to sell new models. As I remember 9-5 will be shown to the public in Frankfurt an sales are due to begin in 2010. That gives K-Saab half a year to “check” the car properly before it goes to dealers. I come back to my point from another post that Saab should be the (only) company who does the real testing of cars before they start selling them as they did in a case of 9000 to give an example. I work for the automotive spare parts company and for us it is clear that somewhere arround 1995 all carmakers decided it was cheaper to call cars for service campaigns than to make them properly. It must be iritating to be called to the dealer to replace badly manufactured brake pump in a car bought 3 months before for lots of money, while your neighbour goes to work a 1992 audi 80 and apart from replacing brake pads has no problems with the car. I think K-Saab attitude to quality will be a key factor to the brand future.
Saab will need to stop making silly US-centric models like the 9-2X and 9-7X and focus on it’s former strengths to get back to it’s old self, even under ownership of another car maker.
The main thing is to not permit Saab to go to China as the way the Chinese economy is gear will result in production of very poor quality product at the cheapest possible price which impacts on Saab’s well-established safety ratings.
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