I’ve just received an email from TTELA alerting me to the transcription they’ve published of the full GM press conference held yesterday.
Eggs and I were both on the conference call but time’s been too short to write much about it. I did live-blog a few points as the conference happened, but not much.
TTELA’s transcript is in English so most of you should be able to read it OK and will not need the services of Googletrans.
There’s some interesting material in there, but there’s also some absolute crapiola as well. To listen to GM saying they tried their best with Saab over 20 years was pretty difficult. It’s amazing when you hear some of this stuff, how evident it is that things are purposefully crafted to sound a certain way.
If you’re interested, the transcript is here.
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{ 124 comments }
Swade – when all this has settled into some kind of conclusion I look forward to reading your book about all the events behind the scenes. You’re better placed to write it than most usual suspects (motor journalists etc).
I’m sure you’d get it published. Look at all of us who read every word you write…
I hate GM! But there is one sentence in TTELA’s transcript that keeps my hope alive:
We will begin the wind down process, but I suppose it is possible that during the wind down process someone, any number of people, might come forward and express interest in Saab or some part of Saab.
JAJ, please get all who were interested on one table and go on the way you have begun. You are on the right track, please don’t give up! Saabsunited and rescue-saab are still alive…
CvK up!
Cowboy up!
Flying Dutchman up!
JAJ up!
Trollhättan up!
Swade up!
SAAB UP FOREVER…
I hate this GM so much.
but this must be usual for a concern which in second world war sold trucks to nazis and the us army.
ITS THE PURE EVIL
Don’t waste your time with this crap, it’s stuff that you really already know. I wasn’t disappointed because I know how these things run. However, I was surprised that John Smith allowed NO details on the transaction(s) and why they didn’t work. That was ostensibly the reason for the press phone call?
i will never buy any american products , in my holl life!!!
Yes the words about trying for twenty years is pure bull.. Took them only 10 years from the 100% ownership date in 2000 to develope and produce the new 9-5, well not even that. Meanwhile they managed to develope and introduce a new Cadillac and kill an unknown number of projects. Yes you really tried your best GM, thanks.
In 2006 GM stated that Saab is an important brand for them. Maybe they were talking about the engineers and not the cars.
I will never consider buying a GM brand. Does anyone care? Probably not. Childish? Yepp. But it feels good.
Anyway thanks Swade and all supporters around the world. I’ll still come back to this site becase you are a great writer Swade and I hope you hang around.
Phil Lacefield Jr. has written a comment worth reading on Yahoo vSAAB titled “Let us continue”. I apologize for being off-topic, but it’s a good read.
http://autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/vSAAB/message/37758
The whole sale thing has just been a farce, but at least GM has been consistent. It hasn’t done any better at trying to sell Saab, than it ever did owning it. From start to finish, it has just been a pathetic charade of gross mismanagement and total ignorance, that has lasted twenty years.
GM is useless and run by idiots. They can’t even sell a company that they do not want after one year.
FUGM.
Sorry for being out of topic. But didn´t Bob Lutz say that all GM vehicles in US will get a chrome piece around the windows (as in NG95)to make them look more European and luxury?
http://www.geting.se/viewimage.php?image=209906-gmpiss.gif
Djupe Strupes out there, give us a picture of the 2005 NG9-5. The Saab that never was. What would it hurt now?
So he pretty much said nothing, surrounded by a whole lot of other words leading up to the nothing.
Then there was the apology about saying nothing.
They couldn’t agree about something, but nothing specific could be said about that.
Apparently things were involved, the things mostly involved stuff, and that stuff had impact on something else.
Everyone clear on those points?
Good
It’s so pathetic seeing all the hatred toward GM while all of you let the real killer (Koenigsegg) off the hook. As a matter of fact, unrealistic audiance like you (and especially Swade) are responsible for the fallout of Saab.
Koenigsegg was chosen out of all the potential buyers obviously due to ideology. The decision was obviously made by Saab Sweden by Swede. What’s better than a Saab being 100% Swede and owned by a supercar company? GM gave the green light because THIS IS WHAT YOU ALL WANT. Don’t you all ever denied that.
So all your fighter jet/million $$ supercar fantasy orgy continue. Still remember all KoenigSaab good time anyone? As the usual (almost racist) kind of hatred toward Chinese, Swade took a cheap shot toward Volvo when it was sold (and survived).
http://www.saabsunited.com/2009/10/thursday-snippets—id-rather-be-at-saab-than-at-volvo-edition.html
DO NOT FORGET IT’S KOENIGSEGG THAT PULL OFF AT THE LAST MINUTE AND KILLED SAAB, at the end of November no less, when the loan was likely approved. [B]Why can’t they just wait for another month or two? They should’ve waited.[/B] The Government didn’t help much either. A entire year were wasted by Swede and the government. Isn’t it ironic that Swede killed Saab, and Chinese saved Volvo? Thanks everyone for help killing off Saab.
um….
What happened with Merbanco? Why didn´t GM let them be the buyer of Saab?
And after GM announced to wind down Saab, I still remember reading some commends about it’d be a perfect Saab where Hirsch being at the technogical/engineering department instead of the evil GM. What’s wrong with these people seriously, Hirsch is just a car dealership. These unrealistic, unhealthy, and twisted mind toward GM, Swede, and Saab (and help promoted by certain blogging) are what killed Saab today.
All the hatred to American products…. not needed and certainly not deserved.
I mean GM is to blame, not Woolrich clothing, McDonalds cheseburgers or our Hollywood movies that everyone loves.
Prozac delivery on its way to certain individual.
my friend, I think you forgot to take your pills….
I think you have some valid points…..
Still….
FUGM for the mismanagement of the brand and company
GM is run by a bunch of fossils with their ugly gas guzzling cars.
Long live the SAAB spirit!
Girl you crazy!
Koenigsegg pulled out because GM started getting greedy, seeing that their business plan for Saab was going to work they wanted their fair share.
And Volvo isn’t sold yet, I wouldn’t be surprised if negotiations for that didn’t work out either.
Has the fat lady sung yet? I can understands everyones anger and disappointment, but I’m more interested in what happens in the next month or so than what has happened and who is to blame.
about brands that got revived… from NY Times
http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/19/spyker-and-saab-and-the-value-of-dead-brands/#preview
No one would review GM if they died. Bunch of morons.
@-1
No one would revive GM if they died. Bunch of morons.
I don’t understand why there was a deadline in selling Saab off so quickly? (Government Motors?) It couldn’t wait until the next year to complete the deal? The Chinese and Ford is still working on the sale of Volvo.
I believe that GM was leaning towards not selling Saab anyways because of future competition in the European market. Gm can make Good money selling Saab assets and at the same time get rid of one less car maker that GM has to go up against. Was looking forward to purchasing the New 9-5. My heart goes out for the Saab brand. I been working on SAAB almost 10years. Great Engineering like no other. Saab will be missed.
Thank you Ixus for your comment. You’re entitled to an opinion, however have you read the interview with Eker from K’egg? It seems we now know what the G in GM actually stands for. Greed. After holding their hand up to the US government to bail them out, they screw over Magna with Opel, and mess up both SAAB deals in the last minute by trying to squeeze the last dollar out.
However it seems GM is getting some very bad press lately (as well from abroad as from within their home country), as well as thousands of not-so-nice emails since yesterday. Maybe an elephant will not die of bee stings, but it will eventually cause him some discomfort. I believe in the power of online communities, and if enough bees sting this dumb elephants ass to make it hurt, it’s worth a try. If not, it’s a good way to deal with anger and frustration.
Mr. Canon, GM vetted all of Saab’s potential bidders, and chose the final candidates. Saab had little say in it. It then gave those candidates impossible conditions to agree to. GM deserves our contempt for playing it’s stupid games, and never seriously intending to sell Saab. Would you as a buyer trying to create a new independent Saab, agree to buying all your components from GM, and then have to pay inflated prices for those parts? I think not. GM deserves all the condemnation it’s getting an a whole lot more.
I don’t know the details, but I can’t understand how come that no one from big car makers don’t want to buy Saab? Saab have a future. How can a couple of idiots decide to close dows something that is much bigger then they are? We are talking about 15000 jobs, families,…? No one is optimistic, I still hope for a miracle to happen! How can Swedish goverment be so miserable? A lot of questions, I know, but if they don’t want Saab, why they don’t let somebody else to work with? Please, is anybody still optimistic?
Ivan
My friend, we all love Saab. But I choose to take the red pill instead when you all choose to take the blue pill. While GM mismanaged Saab, Koenigsegg and the Swede killed it. If the facts hurt, stay in the dream all you want.
At the mean time, I’m exploring the opportunity of acquiring my last new Saab, a ng 9-5, not looking good.
Unfortunately GM is so dumb it won’t feel the Viking battle axe in it’s back, before the lights finally fade before it’s eyes. It’s days are seriously numbered.
Viking Up!!!
What signals are you sending Ixus ? GM is the one to blame.
And the Swedish governement. Not interested in keeping jobs and not proud on their own heritage and possibilities for the future ?
Opel/Vauxhall isn’t out of a financial tempest, but I guess the pressure from the German politics on GM was much higher than from any other country.
It is all about greed. Unwilling positions and getting the most out of it. Even if it is bleeding to death.
So no 9X, no new 9-5, no 9-4X, no Aero-X, no 9-X BioHybrid and no 9-X Air.
So many appealing projects. And what has been done with it ? Nothing.
I suspect even the Trollhattan plant was never intended to be made ready for the new 9-5 production. GM has written off Saab already long ago. All that was made visible was a smoke curtain.
I can’t understand. The only thing I can see clearly was GM never really invested in new products at Saab.
Is it Ed Talking?
K-eggs didnt like the greedy GM. GM gave K-eggs a chanse they didn’t think they could handle. Now, when they showed that they could, GM raised the bar just enough to get rid of the buyer and started the farse we jusr saw ended…
Not surprising, considering the myopic past of GM. The U.S. government should replace the whole executive structure of GM with younger talent that understands what is cool, i.e., product that will actually sell without a myriad of incentives.
Let’s face it, no one wants to buy trucks and shoddily built cars with chrome-festooned ugliness anymore. The bulk of GM’s top brass have an automotive vision stuck in the 70′s and 80′s.
If you look at Opel its clear its going up market to the same audience Saab is in, so when GM was selling it, selling Saab wasn’t an issue. However, now that they kept Opel its a different kettle of fish, particularly as under the terms of the agreement they probably realized that the 95 would be cost competitive with the Insignia.
Yea, right.
If we all was as realistic as you, and gave up what we belevs in or at least is very fond of. What’s the point in anything?
What’s the use of trying to get yourself a brand new 9-5? I mean, you practically gave up by saying “not looking good”
But the the spirit with JÅJ and the blogger you just told to **** himself is a supporting thing. Not something that gave false hope.
We have seen CvK and co do wonders, they practicly did the hole show buy them self, and when GM understood that they was able to pull this thing of, they reallised that this is going to be a competitor one day.
So they started to demand more and more. And the resons? Better to put SAAB to sleep rather than give it away.
It’s there company to slauter sp they do what they want. But we dont have to like what they do, and we can act accordingly.
Therefore: I’m letting my local dealer know that his out of products I would like to have and wish him good luck in the future.
But, if we can put up a fight just put the hole stuff bankrupt, GM will lose there rights unless there is enough money to pay every bill saab have.
What facts? Do YOU know any “facts”?
Maybe you should ask yourself some questions:
1. What was the strategy of GM when choosing the buyers (or was there any strategy)?
2. Why did they choose K-Segg?
3. Why did K-Segg jump off?
4. Why did GM choose Spyker?
5. Why the “December ultimatum”?
5. Why did they finish the process 13 days before the ultimatum ended?
BTW I am watching right now a car television program in a German TV station: they test the Opel Insignia 4×4…:-(
As I wrote in an other entry: maybe we were to naive to believe that GM would sell Saab in a fair way.
A found this att GM´s site….
Let them hear your voice
Sorry, regardless of the situation, the site has a policy of not publishing individual email addresses – SW
http://media.gm.com/content/media/us/en/news/news_detail.brand_gm.html/content/Pages/news/us/en/2009/Dec/1218_Saab_Release
http://media.gm.com/content/media/us/en/news/news_detail.brand_gm.html/content/Pages/news/us/en/2009/Dec/1218_repayment
GM used the BAIC money (the OG9-5 etc,) for paying back the US Government…and we thought Saab could invest that money….
6. Why was Merbanco eliminated without negotiations ?
I can’t believe this. It seems to me that GM has been negotiating in bad faith the entire time. The very fact that they did not adjust the due date for Spyker’s completion of its due diligence argues strongly in favor of this conclusion.
Based on their actions of the past few months, GM’s word is worth absolutely nothing. I would not get my hopes up on the basis of GM saying that the door is still open for the right buyer. They have no interest whatever in selling an intact SAAB.
A pox on them, indeed.
Sorry to say it, but I don’t think there will be a last minute saviour for SAAB.
Having dealt with SAAB’s within the dealer network in the UK since the days of the 9000 and later as an independent I have witnessed first hand the decline in quality, especially over the last 7 or 8 years.
Please do not feel this is a critisism of the factory, quite the opposite, they have done a sterling job to produce a vehicle of such high build with such little investment.
The list of components missing from the 2009 9-5 that were fitted to the original 9-5 for instance is huge. Items such as the covers under the seat runners have gone leaving the painted floor pan exposed, the ditching of the trim around the estate car’s tailgate aperture again leaving welds exposed, laquer reduced to exterior visible parts only, the list is long when you start to look closely.
None of these things on their own are the end of the world, but together they cheapen the vehicle and feel like a downgrade for traditional owners.
GM have totally disregarded and misunderstood the traditional SAAB customer as far as my experience here in the UK is concerened.
GM has applied Vauxhall “stack ‘em high & sell ‘em cheap” sales tactics including lumping SAAB and Vauxhall showrooms together just to reinforce the general public’s misguided opinion that a SAAB is a dressed up Vauxhall.
The costing down of the models in order to drag the retail price down has been totally the wrong direction. SAAB’s should be a car to aspire to, not reduced to entering a Dutch auction for fleet operators.
I really do believe the 2010 9-5 could have done the job. Restricted supply and priced as an exclusive car it could have turned things around as long as the quality went with it. In my opinion people here by BMW’s in the thousands at premium prices not just because they enjoy the drive, but just as importantly to show the neighbours how well they are doing in order to be able to afford a beemer. Superficial I know, but true none the less!
This premium sector is where SAAB once was and where it belongs.
Lastly I feel that GM had no intention to sell SAAB. If anything GM probably think the new 9-5 is better killed off than sold on and allowed to compete with GM’s own products.
GM has not covered itself in glory!
We do not know exactly what really happened behind the scenes but I think it is quite obvious that GM is to blame here. The fact that they do not want to specify what exactly made it impossible for them to sell Saab does not help their case. I think they could have sold Saab but ultimately just did not want to.
Thanks to both Koenigsegg and Spyker for trying!
In this pre-X-mas time, all saab-staff and dealers must be in a rather depressed mood, after this GM winding down decisions.
But I’m awaiting some reaction from JAJ and his team.
Swade, please keep on blogging and keep us informed.
ixus, you ovbiously didnt read the part where K-G said that GM was getting way to greedy in its dealings with the group. Lets face it GM never seriously wanted to keep SAAB around from 20Feb2009 but decided to drag out the process to save face by making unrealistic demands on any buyer. If GM really wanted to sell SAAB they would have done. I
sincerely hope GM dies which it will because they seem to think that by being nationalised by the US and Canadian governments that they are safe. They still build cr*p cars, they still have that stoneage mentality and the Japanese are walking all over them STILL! With regard to the press connference I dont even want to read it as its all SAABs fault anyway.
Now where do I get my hands on one of those FUGM stickers for my SAAB!!!???
I feel like keying a Cadillac today.
Hey Ixus, take one Prozac and call me in the morning! Clearly, you haven’t been following this story for very long. Um…suggest you do a little more fact finding. And a goods principle to follow (because it can save you some much embarrassment) is to engage brain before engaging mouth! Now be a good boy and go and lie down
http://www.zazzle.com
@ all Americans, I stand by you, but the kind of Greed that FUGM stands for,
is what got this crisis started. It must stop.
Anyone understand the industry knows that GM has no intention to let go of Opel. In fact, all the latest GM cars are engineered based on Opel and Holden platform/engine. Opel/Holden are critical of GM’s survival, and they would never let go of those two brands. GM (cars) are no longer designed by American. it was just an act to the US audience.
The sales of Saab is serious and going on for a much longer time when you compare it to the sales of Saturn and Opel. It would be SO NAIVE and silly to believe that Saab Sweden has absolutely no input in choosing Koenigsegg group over a more qualifying buyers. Do you believe it’s a pure coincident that a Swede group was chosen by a Swedish auto maker? It’s Koenigsegg that couldn’t get the money flowing as their plan. And there’s the involvement of BAIC because of Koenigsegg money issue. It’s all Koenigsegg (and partly Swede government) no matter how you look at it. What GM did to Saab all these years is well documented. But I have to lay the blame to the Saab killer to where it’s due; Koenigsegg kills Saab, with the help of Swede Government, and perhaps your prejudice toward certain groups?
Just do not forget Koenigsegg is the one who pull out of Saab deal TO THE SURPRISE OF EVERYONE including GM. If some of you want to play the usual evil GM conspiracy theory based on GM pull Saab before December, do not conveniently forget that Koenigsegg too withdraw way before their own November deadline. Isn’t that just another PREJUDICE my fellow Saab lovers?
I did not give up acquiring a ng 9-5. I said not looking good based on the response I received from the dealer.
you guys are not going to key my Chevy Truck are you?
Not the drivers faults…. it lays all at GM’s managements….
My wife works at GMAC….. had nothing to do with this, she hates GM for how they handled Saab, but the workers and drivers had nothing to do with all of this….
we need to keep the blame where it belongs….
Now there is leaking information on how far the Spyker deal did come. And acording to svt.se there were only minor thing left to do.
The financial was done, the production volume was set to only 57.000 cars 2010 and still aproved!
The only thing left to investigae was the econmy of the buyer. And that looked good as far the did know about it.
http://svt.se/2.22620/1.1821093/saab_hade_affarsplanen_klar
Googletrans:
“Saab had the business plan ready
Most of the big issues for Saab – as finance and business – was solved when General Motors yesterday backed off from the deal with the Dutch sports car manufacturer Spyker.
It says sources within the Saab to report today.
Saabs ledning har de senaste veckorna jobbat intensivt för att få alla pusselbitar på plats och vara klara före årsskiftet – den tidsfrist som GM:s styrelse gett för att affären skulle vara klar. Saab’s leadership in recent weeks has been working hard to get all the pieces in place and be completed by year end – the deadline that GM’s board of directors called for that deal would be completed.
Och många problem var redan lösta. And many problems were already solved. Finansieringen, som tidigare varit ett stort bekymmer, var ordnad. The funding, which has previously been a major concern, was orderly.
Genom att Saab hade fått in 1,4 miljarder kronor från den kinesiska biltillverkaren BAIC för att sälja ut teknologi och gamla verktyg så hade ekonomin förbättrats. By that Saab had received 1.4 billion from the Chinese automaker BAIC to sell technology and old tools so the economy had improved.
Därmed ökade chanserna att få ett lån från Europeiska investeringsbanken på 4 miljarder kronor. Thereby increasing the chances of obtaining a loan from the European Investment Bank on 4 billion. Efter möten i veckan hade banken lämnat positiva besked om affärsplanen. After meetings this week, the Bank had made positive statements about the business plan. Det enda som återstod var att göra en genomgång av den nye ägaren Spykers ekonomi. The only thing that remained was to make a review of the new owner Spykers economy.
Även förhandlingarna med Riksgälden drevs i en positiv anda och bedömdes inte vara något problem. Although negotiations with the Debt Office was run in a positive manner and were not considered to be a problem.
Under det senaste året hade affärsplanen som Saab bygger sin verksamhet på blivit allt mer försiktig. Over the past year was the business plan that Saab builds its business on becoming more cautious. I år skulle företaget sälja 40.000 bilar. This year, the company would sell 40,000 cars. Nästa år var prognosen 57.000 och år 2011 hoppades företaget få upp volymen till strax under 100.000 bilar. Next year the forecast was 57,000 and in 2011 the company hoped to up the volume to just under 100,000 cars.
Nu blir det istället en nedläggning. Now it becomes instead a closure. “
Could the close down of Saab be a way for GM to gain favour at Opel, (since Opel have tried to close Saab before). I guess GM will need to gain some thrust there (maybe I´m so disappointed I getting paranoid)
Sorry…something went wrong with my googletrans…
Why did GM not let Merbanco participate, you ask?
Probably because they could actually pull is off. And save Saab.
Naturally this is a win for Opel and a small consolation for the fact that they remain trapped in GM.
SVT-story that papers were due to be signed this weekend is very interesting. Might explain timing of GM decision.
I was always surprised that GM would sell any make or model to a competitor. What sense does that make? It could really come back to bite them in the arse.
Does Jaguar and Land Rover take away sales from Lincoln Mercury? Sure does… so why spin one off? Unless they are getting a sweet deal “money” why would any company do that.
It’s like Dell selling a few of their laptop models to Gateway. And some of the models haven’t even been released yet.
I think someone wised up at GM and said why would we do this?…
Just my opinion
I own 2 saabs, so the last thing I wanted to read was this, but at the same time I’m not surprised one bit.
Jim
PS I think someone will at some point buy the Saab name and start it up again.
It’s not 1 January 2010, yet. This game is not over.
Buck stops with Big Ed. Don’t forget that.
Don’t key my Saab just because it is a GM car. I don’t know what Ed is driving.
Cowboy Up!
Well, that was a rhetorical question to supplement Alexandros’ list of questions (above) , to visualize what GM’s true intents in the ‘sale’ process were.
Which, of course, you just answered.
There’s nothing coming form them, i suppose. They were ordered by Greedy Mismanagement not to communicate to the outside, see saabnewsroom http://newsroom.saab-web.com/
But will they continue build the Cadillac BLS in Trollhättan? Or have they stopped that?
@74stingray, hmm, now you got me thinking, Maybe this bad boy could teach your Chevy a lesson
http://www.trollhattansaab.net/archives/2009/02/saab-monster-truck.html
Swade: I think GM did their best it’s just that GM is such a terrible company that the last 20 years was all they could do. Makes me wish Fiat had gotten Saab years ago. Even though Alfa is in trouble I can see a scenario where Saab and Alfa sold side by side could have flourished especially in North America
It is pretty obvious that the deal did not crash because of the buyer. It was never GM’s intention to sell. At 40k levels in 2010 and possibly 90-100k in 2011 Saab would really not be a big competitor to GM. Not in any way. Not at all. Not on this planet.
This is the result of greed and mischievousness from GM. I find no other reason behind this and they will ultimately hang for this unless they repent.
Spread the word, tell the world what kind of company GM is.
I think someone should strike a deal with GM and create a public campaign where Saab enthusiasts can donate/contribute $$$ to keep it alive. Let says a target $10 million or something. Imagine what a great ad and PR campaign that would be…let’s find a creative way to bring Saab back!
I hate GM realy, they wont put any effort in Saab, i hope it is not the end of Saab, but i am glad no one can take my Saab 900NG S away from me.
Well, Rescue SAAB sure as hell showed the power of SAAB enthusiasts uniting. The mosaic was a pretty memorable event. I guess online communities could do impressive things.
“I feel like keying a Cadillac today.”
that’s funny.
- I believe GM only wanted to sell SAAB if SAAB had no chance of making / competing with GM. GM wants SAAB to die and say they tried to sell. They do not fool me and I will not buy a GM car ever. My next car will be an Audi or Subaru.
Just because K-G said GM was being “too greedy” doesn’t make it a fact. Thats the way negotiations go. There are generally two sides – the side that is too greedy and the side that wants something for nothing. GM was too greedy and K-G wanted something for nothing. GM wasn’t going to give away Saab for free. Since they couldn’t get upfront cash, they had to work in future considerations such as Saab buying parts from GM to make up lost money. The problem with the Saab sale was that there were no buyers with REAL money. I mean if Wal-Mart or Exxon wanted to get into the car business they could have forked over a couple billion dollars and GM would have been more then happy to sell. I doubt GM would have been afraid of competition from Saab if they had gotten the money they wanted.
Whether you like capitalism or not, GM’s duty in this situation is to do whatever is best for GM’s bottom line.
I have a suggestion. If the IP in the 95 is the problem for GM why not just buy the brand name (it would be cheaper), scrap the factory and then run a small micro operation – the size of a Noble or Spyker or something. These days you either have to be huge or micro, not in-between.
-Vi var på väg upp till Stockholm och skulle skriva kontrakt. Då hände något. Men vad? Ingen aning, säger han.
-We where on our way to Stockholm to sign the contract,then something happened, but what excactly what? that we dont know ,says Eric Geers
http://ttela.se/ekonomi/saab/1.680236
New article at TTELA about 90 minutes ago – http://ttela.se/ekonomi/saab/1.680236 : “Agreement hours away”. Improved Google translated excerpt:
[…]
According to TTELA an agreement between GM and Spyker Cars was only hours away when the GM suddenly blew off everything. The picture is confirmed on Saturday afternoon by Saab’s CIO Eric Geers.
“We were going up to Stockholm and would sign contracts. Then something happened. But what? No idea,” he says.
Saab’s General Counsel Kristina Geer was sitting in the airplane in Landvetter [outside Gothenburg], having prepared contracts with her when she suddenly was reached by the news that everything was blown off.
A few hours earlier Saab chief Jan Ake Jonsson had received the both dramatic and unexpected message from GM. In the morning, a meeting was held where GM announced that it would not continue the process.
According to Eric Geers, it was not just Saab, which was taken by surprise.
-This was a huge surprise to Victor Muller (Spykers CEO), said Geers.
Victor Muller was in place in Stockholm, also expecting to sign contracts.
“We had come a long way and I need to pay homage to Spyker Cars. They have shown a tremendous commitment to the issue.”
[…]
My father has always had SAABS and from a small child I admired and adored them,I always liked to collect anything SAAB as a child(And now have a great collection of SAAB material).I worked for SAAB shortly after leaving school n 1993 and worked for them up until last year when a relocated to a new country,however from apprentice to master technician,I always loved the product even when challenged by the sometimes strange faults!I was lucky enough to work at Trollhattan opposite the main factory in 1999,altough only for a few weeks I still have found memories of my time their.I am at present working as a SAAB specialist and slowly building up a customer base,I will always love this brand and block anything owned or built by GM,I have owned apx 13 different SAABs and between my father and myself run presently @5 different models,my the collection grow.My sincere best wishes to all employees at SAAB and I hope some miracle can happen before SAAB is lost forever,this brand should never have been under GMs control,maybe this situation would have occurred in the 1990s without thier intervention but I am sure with better management and investment this brand could have taken on BMW,come on SAAB lets see those new products.
Hello!
Here’s a sad youtube clips with Saab cars over the years, we in Trollhättan is depressed and hoping for a good end for Saab.
I hope everyone has a merry Christmas and we all are glad for any information from saab united!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ci7DGbPG_AQ
MERRY CHRISTMAS!
Tremendous article from USA Today about the whole Saab tragedy and GM’s role
http://content.usatoday.com/communities/driveon/post/2009/12/five-lessons-that-gm-can-learn-from-the-saab-debacle/1
@Swade,
have you started sharing your insider information with Jan-Erik Berggren from Expressen? Check this out:
http://www.gt.se/nyheter/1.1819702/hemlig-grupp-kan-radda-saab
Shortly, a Swedish group has started negotiations with Deutsche Bank and GM. The group is also a Swedish government favorites, and it wouldn’t be hard to get their support. Also the group is interested in the BAIC deal, which could potentially give job for 1200 persons. And the source is of course you Swade.
Swade, is anything in the article true? Please, give us any hint, if you cannot give the complete information!
Merry Christmas to you too, and keep the faith.
I guess that most of the people here at SU share my frustration and anger towards GM Management and board of directors. And that’s exactly where the anger should be aimed. As an SAAB employee I have been working with people from both Opel and GM North America and I have really enjoyed it.We’ve always had a great working relationship,especially with our colleagues in GM NA. In fact some of my best friends work at GM NA so that’s ABSOLUTELY NOT where the anger and frustration should be aimed.
I know who I blame: GM Managment and BoD and Our f–king government. I feel that I’m in my full right to do so. GM for neglecting the SAAB brand and in the end deciding to kill it. The government for not understanding the urgency and acting accordingly.
It is extremely frustrating to be in a position where you can’t do anything about you anger or the fact that SAAB most likely will go away (altough I still have hope for it to survive).
I have absolutely no anger toward all the people working for GM but I will never buy another GM car.
This is really starting to look like a criminal mischief on GM’s behalf.
umm…what you just described makes me think GM really is a bunch of “Greedy” people.
Look, other than getting cash for parts and services you seems to conclude that
GM wasn’t going to give away “Saab”, the brand, for free.
I mean, if GM could get away with unloading the Saab brand itself for $1 they should have taken it…really..
instead they saw a business oppertunity..err..not really the time to try to squezze a few more dollars more out of the deal.
Deutsche bank already approved K_EGG, i do think they could have carried the
cost of all of the service agreements made for Saab ranging from IT-service down to indivudal parts on the vehicle.
I do think this Saab wind-down is one of the strangest move i have ever encountered.But concerning GM and tactics..i mean.. just look around,look at the Hummer deal..looks right to you ?
The article seems to be pretty much in line with what Swade has been saying here. Berggren states that the information is coming from Swade.
What I don’t really understand about this secret group is why they would insist on staying secret, even more so if they have been having trouble getting invited to the negotiation table. I mean, if they have been neglected by GM and/or DB, some publicity would have been good for their case, wouldn’t it?
VW did a nice work with Audi, but Audi stands for NOTHING. Just like BMW.
Subaru, on the other hand, builds great cars, and stopped partnership with GM. Just guess why
Here about Audi vs Ford
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsWvK92HNpM
If you support Ford, a company with GREAT management, a main competitor for GM, on the US market, you will harm GM.
That’s definitly be my next car. Focus RS, because kicking GM scum; it’s fun.
Cheers.
I agree, I heard about this secret buyer before. Please, we need some kind of spark to live for again. We deserve that. But if this silence from swede mean something and if it is important, than just be quiet and surprise us!
One name…. BOB LUTZ. Jezz you realy can make people hurt you _____ __ ____! (Fill in the blank with an appropriate ending)
SAAB Will survive!!!!!!! CJ of Merbanco… Please pick up the pieces and put it all together with asistance from that Swedish group. You have a winner. Continue with the 9-5 and scrap the 9-4X. Build the 9-3 together with Hyundai. And if you doo you will get peoples sympathies and the company could grow like crazy real fast!
Cheers/ Tom R from Sweden
True, but Jan-Erik gives more details in his article.
I have been thinking of this: What if GM has got a better offer in the last minute? Instead of giving SAAB almost for free to Spyker, with not so certain chances for income from them, they got an offer from the Swedish group, cash for a part of SAAB, not the whole company. That part would firstly support BAIC but eventually would become a technology consultant company, like Lotus, maybe with slim product line produced in China. Also they would also support Swedish government and start developing and building electric cars.
Not so unrealistic, or? This is a pure speculation, a result of my thinking, and not insider information!!!
There’s a full translation of the TTELA story in the Snippet thread, here.
Swade is with his family on holiday, what the really deserves after everything he did for Saab, for us. Let’s stop hoping. Wake up as I just did. It’s not a dream.
Enjoy the great video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ci7DGbPG_AQ
damn i am gone miss SAAB my first car was a SAAB 99 Turbo and i have so many nice memories from that car.
and me and my wife where hopping to buy the new 9-5 but it looks like we gone go for a new Nissan Maxima now .
are they still gone make the Cadillac in the old SAAB factory ? that would at lest give some people job.
ohh
and marry Christmas everyone
If you read TTLA at this moment, you wonder way GM took this dicission. I seems that everybody was prepared too sign on, then GM or was it the US goverment who stopped it? GM i own by the stae of US!
I will have my nr. ten SAAB deliverd tomorrow, which was procuced last freday afternoon.
Tanks Swade.
1. How long until the local Cadillac dealer calls me? I WILL NEVER buy anything from GM (unless they retain SAAB).
2. GM really screwed this one up. As an America- I am disgusted that my tax money went to these clowns. They are clueless. They took Saab on when it needed it- granted- but they got far more from it than they ever put in.
As per The Local:
“According to John Smith, vice chairman of the GM’s board, GM realised on Friday afternoon that is was impossible to save the Swedish auto manufacturer, and that therefore was no reason to wait until next year to make a decision, as had previously been promised.
As per The Local and Mr Smith:
“Sometimes it just doesn’t work,” Smith told TT news agency.
He said that the goal is to shut down operations as quickly as possible. New investors are not being sought. “We have investigated all possibilities,” the vice chairman said.
Smith reported that the GM has a ballpark figure for the cost of shutting down Saab, but declined to say how much. He blamed the car industry as a whole for the failure.
He declined to comment on questions regarding GM’s responsibility as an owner. “We have tried to integrate Saab into GM in order to create quality products. But we have been unsuccessful for a variety of reasons. We have tried,” Smith said.”
I think it says it all.
Oops, bummer. I didn’t check the other thread. Thanks.
I JUST saw this on Twitter:
Saab may not be dead. The Swedish Govt. meeting this weekend and Monday on a plan to make it state-owned or at least half-owned.
I don’t know whether it’s true or not. I’ve asked for a source (the original tweet was here: http://twitter.com/davidkiley/status/6834827315)
so we’ll see what happens. I find it highly unlikely, but desperate times call for desperate measures and all that…?
“We have tried” Smith said
Hmm 1 new model between 9-5 launch in 1997 and 2009 leaving the bread and butter 9-3 old and the flagship 9-5 13 years old.
Jesus GM what happens when you dont try…………
I’m a Romanian owner of a 9.5 Aero and I’m quite disappointed of what happened in the last few months.
The truth is as simple as that:
GM didn’t care about SAAB. They sold the old lines to the Chinese and made money out of it. I think this was their only target. The rest is PR bullshit… Instead of investing the money, they preferred to keep ownership over patents (similar to what happened to Opel) and technologies than having another competitor for their crappy American cars. Otherwise it’s absolutely unbelievable to prefer to close a business with 2-3 new products waiting in the line then sell it to somebody who pays something for that and is ready to assume a risk in order to acquire the business.
I wonder whether the “problems” that GM “discovered” with the deal with Spyker were the same “problems” that made K-egg to withdraw. Why did nobody ask this at the press conference?
The whole story doesn’t quite make sense: First GM sets a DEADline. Then GM declares that deadline not to be a DEADline but a date by which a POTENTIAL new owner should be more or less identified. No need to finish the deal by then. But then GM declares SAAB dead even before that softened deadline approached.
Here’s my theory: After the surprising decision to not sell but retain Opel, they didn’t want to create a competitor that would be able to offer competing cars in the US, in Asia and in Europe. It was just an internal battle within GM, and the OPEL side won over the let’s-sell-SAAB side.
So, I bet GM will not sell the new tools for the 9-5 because that would be tantamount to basically selling SAAB, wouldn’t it?
We have tried,” Smith said.”
Is that guy for real? ….What a donkey
Bobo Lutz, you are a disgrace to your nation.
And Maud Olofsson one of the same to ours.
I say adain… CJ!!!! Listen mate. Pick up what is left and make a success!!! It´s only money!
Tom
Could turn out a significant win for Opel, namely if they will produce the 9-5 in Rüsselsheim, as was originally plotted. But this time, as an Opel. (as I already assumed).
Incidently, I wouldn’t be surprised if Saab AB would buy back any rights to the brand Saab, so that it doesn’t end up being used for something like a railway company (like PanAm).
Saab is not the first victim of the crisis (see e.g. Karmann or all those plants that are being shut down now), but it’s the most serious one so far, and quite a loss to automobile diversity and heritage, on par with the loss of Rover (but more competent)
I will NEVER drive anything other than SAAB. Lots of us feel the same. So there IS a market for SAAB.
TEBUILD and make ir right this time. PLEASE HELP MERBANCO!!!!!!!!
GM had no reason to see SAAB continue as a viable concern if SAAB was going to present a viable competition to ANY of GM’s business lines. Selling the factory and allowing the production and sale of mature vehicle technologies by a competitor to GM’s line makes little sense from a business perspective.
So GM had to limit use and access to whatever ‘proprietary’ technology it had in the current and upcoming SAAB vehicles, something that would have severely limited the ability of a buyer to produce cars in a timely manner.
Add to that the removal of every GM SAAB dealer from the marketing system (virtually all of the US dealership program) and you get a very limited market for the buying company.
The only future for SAAB is if the brand name is purchased by a third party, and then a new car, basically without any GM technology is produced by the factory. That would mean retooling for a couple of years.
Maybe a Russian or Chinese company that needs a ‘respectable’ brand name could buy the carcass of SAAB and revive it. Or KIA should buy it and make it their high-end brand. But then we circle back to competition with GM products, and see how it may be wiser for GM to kill SAAB off outright, take the hit in the short term and think in the long term.
Why did GM suddenly change their mind? It´s reported in ttela that also Victor Muller was surprised by this, that contradicts what was said on GMs pressconferens.
The only thing that changed between GMs decision to make december evaluation month and the sudden shutdown two weeks later was that SAAB got 1,4 billion krona for old tools. Perhaps this deal was too good, now GM gets the money, don´t they?
I think GM is in such chaos at the mothership in detroit that SAAB in far away Sweden is a low priority. Not selling the new 9-5 and the brand is probably the easiest way out of getting rid of the “SAAB problem” from their standpoint. No need to go through the complicated process of protecting their IP, etc.
After all they got the billions from the U.S. government so now they don’t care about the money they will not get from not selling SAAB. GM and the large U.S. banks are only out for their own survival. Expediency is the name of the game.
Look at the banks, now scrambling to repay their loans, mainly so they can do what they always do. Go back to feeding from the trough. Shelling out the big bonuses to the top guys.
Letter from Jan-Åke Jansson to employees of SAAB Automobil. I don’t think it’s posted here yet…
http://www.expressen.se/Nyheter/1.1820084/har-ar-saabs-vd-jan-ake-jonssons-brev-till-de-anstallda
In Swedish
Awake, i dont agree.
First, Saab is never going to compete head to head against GM. I mean the fluctation of people in a small suburb outside of Detroit
is equal to the sum of all saab sales.
Secondly,if GM really was scared about a main competitor in Saab. You could always combine that statement with Smiths own words
“We have tried” and the GM board must have said to themself:
“hm, we have tried everything we could, but wait since we are the worst automotive company there is a huuuuge chance of
great success in a new Saab without GM involvment so lets wind it down”
No,they simply are too greedy at the moment. They dont know what they are doing. That is why there is no real answers why to shut it down and left
open for speculations.
There will be a cars developed and build in Trollhättan.
I echo that,
Chaos is the word, they simply dont know what they are doing. You wont see the NG 9-5 as a Opel. They will wind it down as well not matter the cost.
Interesting rumour! But there’s no way in hell that the Swedish gov is going to step in and own or part-own the company now, not after all the categorical statements made by Maud, and by the PM himself.
Still, if some arrangement could be worked out where it didn’t appear that the government were behind it, then anything is possible. A nice private company in front, with a few big-name investors to lend credibility, and then some serious tax-payer money hidden in the background – I guess that’s not entirely out of the question. In politics, of course, realities are irrelevant and appearance is everything.
@ixus
methinks you need more than a ‘red pill’
Bottomline: GM does not want SAAB around – neiter as part of GM nor competitor. For that reason they have “faked” two potential sales and speak in tongues. Probably, the picture changed for them when they decided to keep Opel. They are not overly interested to see the NG9-5 brought to marked plus they have their concerns about the future technical competition from Trollhättan. GM simply prefers to dismantle SAAB and with the cash infusion from the BAIC deal they now have a good part of the funding required to do so.
Consequnetly I am not overly optimistic by the rumors that a Swedish group is in the play. GM does not want a sale go through! I really really hope but ….
This is the most ugly face of unconstrained economic liberalisme and it’s staggering that a mainly publicly owned company, hold afloat by the american administration to save the jobs, operates in such a cynic manner. SAAB is equally important to Sweden as GM to US.
SAAB’s last chance, I believe, is if the Swedish goverment succed to get the message across to the Obama administration, and impact the board that way round, that this behaviour is unacceptable when a sale is infact possible.
I will NEVER by a GM car. This is turely a company with very low ethics.
Lets face it, GM does not want to sell SAAB, they just want to close it down. Having read the thread regarding SAAB people being on the plane to Stockholm it seems like GM were p**sing everyone about.
Is ixus in fact Bob Lutz?
As a US taxpayer I demand that GM sell SAAB to recoup some of the money that they have borrowed from me.
GM – you guys are crooks! You embarass me. If you ever hearken “American Values” in your advertisement going forward I will curse your name. Your evil ways are not my American Values.
There are bound to be two sides to this issue.
Totally blaming GM for the failure to sell Saab to buyers who were quite suspect financially is not fair. Facts must be faced. Neither Ksegg nor Spyker are financially strong so that meant that GM could not have an easy exit from Saab. It meant that GM was going to have to be involved with Saab for some time and face further future unknown liability.
When any seller faces unknown future liability, the seller always has a tendency to ask for more than the buyer thinks the property or business is worth.
So I am not surprised that Ksegg thought GM was greedy. GM probably overestimated what its future liability would be, just to have a comfortable margin for error, but it really had no choice, but to do so.
If a buyer had come in with hard cold cash and taken GM completely out of the picture, GM being in bankruptcy, would probably have had no choice but to accept the deal. But GM didn’t get a buyer like that.
To compound the situation, GM’s decision not to sell Opel meant that GM would have had to consider the competition Opel got from Saab. So that meant GM also had to consider how much Saab sales might have cost Opel. To cover that loss, GM would have had to get even more from the buyer.
In the end, Germany stepped up and protected Opel and Sweden did not protect Saab. So Germany wins out and Sweden looses.
Unless Sweden steps up and strongly backs Saab and/or Volvo, or unless the Nordic countries of Sweden, Finland, Norway and Denmark form a regional financial alliance and step up and strongly back Saab and/or Volvo, these two marques will not make it. Nowadays it really takes strong government backing for an auto manufacturer to make it. The government either needs to commit to buy large volumes of cars or it needs to commit to some other kind of financial support and/or protection from foreign competition.
I, for one, an getting rather tired with these remarks like “Neither Ksegg nor Spyker are financially strong so that meant that GM could not have an easy exit from Saab”…
GM said they were looking to EXCLUSIVELY talk to Spyker so how the heck is that SAAB’s fault? So what is in fact being said here is that in this case both Deutsche Bank and Grossly Mismanaged are incompetent idiots!!!
Yes, really, why would GM sell SAAB? They stand to make a lot more having them out of the competition. I have owned two SAABs and own one now. One sales manager who did not like SAAB at GM (and some do like SAAB at GM who work there, by the way,) said to me, essentially, “We have everything we want from SAAB, their drive train, their hybrid technology that we will use and it is ours now because we own them. We are going to dump them.” He said it in not a very nice way to me one year ago. Well if there was not a law, I would have punched him even being a gal. That being said, consider what a good deal it is to pretend to sell SAAB and get SAAB to put their very best innovations out there to be bought for their survival even an electric car. All of that technolgy GM gets to keep.
But if it comes out of sheer greed on GM’s managment part, greed blinds and likely they missed something in their blindness. Something they will never see having most of them never owned the car, even. Something that most Sweds may not see since they live in Sweden and its in their back yard. That is, it is a breed apart and has its own destiny meant not to be controlled and maligned but to be a part of a greater whole of our planet. The jewel won’t be in anyones crown next time. A “Gollum” will save it and give it to someone to be of use for good not for evil to rise again not under anyones control. (For those familiar with The Lord of the Rings.) In its abscence, Sweden will realize what they did not see in their own back yard and give it a different perspective next time. Otherwise, if they don’t, it will be adopted out to another home.
Yes, really, why would GM sell SAAB? They stand to make a lot more having them out of the competition. I have owned two SAABs and own one now. One sales manager who did not like SAAB at GM (and some do like SAAB at GM who work there, by the way,) said to me, essentially, “We have everything we want from SAAB, their drive train, their hybrid technology that we will use and it is ours now because we own them. We are going to dump them.” He said it in not a very nice way to me one year ago. Well if there was not a law, I would have punched him even being a gal. That being said, consider what a good deal it is to pretend to sell SAAB and get SAAB to put their very best innovations out there to be bought for their survival even an electric car. All of that technolgy GM gets to keep.
But if it comes out of sheer greed on GM’s managment part, greed blinds and likely they missed something in their blindness. Something they will never see having most of them never owned the car, even. Something that most Sweds may not see since they live in Sweden and its in their back yard. That is, it is a breed apart and has its own destiny meant not to be controlled and maligned but to be a part of a greater whole of our planet. The jewel won’t be in anyones crown next time. A “Gollum” will save it and give it to someone to be of use for good not for evil to rise again not under anyones control. (For those familiar with The Lord of the Rings.) In its abscence, Sweden will realize what they did not see in their own back yard and give it a different perspective next time. Otherwise, if they don’t, it will be adopted out to another home.
To all the Koenigsegg excusers on this forum,
Do you not find it a bit ironic that a man (Mr. Eker) who has associated himself with a car company (Koenigsegg) that sells cars for more than one million euros apiece would accuse another car company (GM) of being greedy?
GM has a duty to its stockholders, which includes the American taxpayers through the U.S. government, to get the best possible price for Saab, whether it be as a viable car company or as parts of a former car company. GM, you can be sure, has a pretty good idea of what the total value of the parts of Saab is – after all, they poured millions of dollars into Saab’s transmission factory and assembly plant to make them what they are today. That then establishes the minimum price for Saab as a whole. The fact that Koenigsegg may have been unwilling, or more likely unable, to pay that price would not make GM greedy. It would just make the Koenigsegg Group losers.
Did GM want more than that. We don’t know, but here’s a possible reason why they might: Do you remember the dimissal of the 81 Saab dealers in the U.S. that generated such outrage? This hatchet (or Viking axe) job on some of Saab’s most loyal dealers was instigated by Koenigsegg’s agent in America, Saab Cars North America (SCNA) as part of Koenigsegg’s plan to take Saab “upscale” (meaning unaffordable to most of us). Since these dealers were GM dealers GM would have had to pay the considerable cost of franchise cancellation. Remember it was just after this debacle that Koenigsegg quit. Could it have been that GM wanted Koenigsegg to pay for booting these dealers and Koenigsegg couldn’t or wouldn’t? We’ll probably never know, but it just might have been the rich boys of Koenigsegg refusal to pay that killed the deal.
It didn’t go down that way, DFF.
Word is that Saab have had a list for some time and that anyone who takes Saab on will most likely trim the dealer lineup. Hopefully they don’t use the same criteria because some of the cuts were terrible.
It’ll be some time before the truth of the Ksegg deal comes out, but if Saab die, it won’t be because of them. If Saab live, the fact that their pull out created a sense of urgency will have helped.
I don’t know about K-egg and Bard but Spyker had more than enough financial backing to buy and run Saab. Converse alone has sufficient funds for that and if Mubadala had joined them the threesome probably could have bought GM if they wanted. Which they would be crazy to do, and they are not crazy. Money issues or some due-diligence stuff can’t have been the true motive for GM to have pulled out of the deal. I think they actually let the deal fall through exactly because it threatened to materialize, something they had never expected to happen. After all, they had attached near-impossible conditions to the ‘sale’ in order to shy away any serious potential buyer. But Spyker and Converse probably did accept them. And that’s when they pulled the plug on the deal and on Saab.
I think GM were just going through the motions of selling Saab for PR purposes because, like Estee wrote, they already had all they wanted from Saab, had decided to keep Opel and Vaxhall and didn’t need any competition from an independent Saab for crucial models of Opel and Vauxhall. Moreover, they probably had to give the US Govt. (actual owner of GM holding over 60% of GM share capital) and the US people (who ‘own’ the Govt.) the impression that they were acting responsibly by not squandering taxpayers’ money on some unimportant car plant in a faraway European country and actually ‘tried to sell’ this bottomless (yeah, right…) pit of a quirky little Swedish car builder to make some money for the American people. “But, well, Mr. President, you see, the first candidate was a grandstanding hobby club with no money (so why did you pick them in the first place?). And the other one, well, it wouldn’t be ethical, now would it, to sell American-owned technology (yeah, right…) to someone who may be backed by the Russki mob (it was that same ‘mobster’ whom GM picked themselves as the one and only prospective buyer) so, you see, we had no choice than to shut them down…”. Or something like that. So now they can set up this mutual admiration society in their boardroom, thump their collective chests and occupy the highest possible moral ground for being such able, cautious and ethical business tycoons.
And they don’t even have to explain themselves to all those thousands of families who are going to have a hell of a Christmas. “You see, that little job was well done as well because, after all, we did send them an email, now didn’t we? What more could we have done?”
I say let Saab go bankrupt in Sweden and let it be acquired intact by someone who knows how to run a niche carbuilder. And let GM have fun litigating in Swedish courts (because that’s where the bankruptcy would happen) about who has the rights to building the new 9-5. Can’t take all that long before they pull out of that, too, for lack of funds. For gods sake, they owe almost 2 billion US $ for engines to a Japanese company (was it Subaru? or Isuzu? cannot remember…) that they can’t repay. How about these guys demand Saab in lieu of that?
Ivo
“GM has a duty to its stockholders”
There are no stockholders. What the US Government wants was to fire the old guys. They did that. Saving jobs in Sweden is not at the top of the to do list of the US Government.
GM stock is currently worthless. So, don’t use that line.
There are two ways to buy a piece of property or buy a business and they have very different ramifications for the seller.
The first way is for the buyer to pay cash or to get outside financing to pay for the property or business. In this first situation, the buyer takes the seller’s property or business and the seller is completely relieved of all liabilities for the property or business.
The second way is for the seller to partially or totally finance the sale because the buyer is financially incapable of paying cash or getting his own financing. This second way leaves the seller with lots of future problems and liabilities. If the buyer can’t make the business work or pay for the property, the seller may have to take it back.
For all of you who say these buyers were strong enough financially, you are wrong. Both sales were structured in the second manner. It is quite clear that is the case or Swedish government guarantees would not have been necessary. GM was going to have to continue to finance Saab for a number of years. It meant that if the buyers could not perform and pay off GM as promised, GM might have to come in and take the company back from the new owners.
Many, many sellers of property and business do not want to sell when they have to finance or partially finance the sale. And for those who do, most of the time the sellers really do not want to be in a position where they might have to come back in and take over the business or property they just sold. Many would rather liquidate or hang on to the property rather than have to go through that.
Moreover, GM was in the highly unusual position of having had to file bankruptcy and having the US government become its major shareholder. Under that scenario, GM does not have the leeway a business would have if that were not the case. It may not have been in the position where it could take the risk of having to take Saab back if the new owners failed.
Despite what others have said, it is quite clear to me that these two buyers did not have the financial strength that buying Saab required without GM partially financing the sale. If they had, the Swedish government would have never needed to have been involved at all.
“US government become its major shareholder”
Try stakeholder not shares. GM has no shares.
@ davidgmills
I fully understand your arguments.
BUT then why in God’s name did GM choose first K-Segg and then Spyker????
Why not Merbanco and even Renco??? They are definitely stronger than the other two!
I tell you my friend, this stinks!
Penske had far more money than Merbanco and Renco did and he couldn’t do a deal with GM for Saturn. Penske claimed the deal breaker for Saturn was that he could find no manufacturer to make Saturn cars in the future.
GM was kind of in the same box with Saturn — it would have had continued involvement in Saturn because it would have had to manufacture Saturn cars because nobody else would.
It is always the continued involvement of the seller in some fashion that is the deal killer. The seller wants a clean break and can’t find a way to get it.
Ironically, I think Penske had the financial stroke to buy both Saturn and Saab and Saab would have solved Penske’s problem of not having a future manufacturer to build cars. I think a Penske buy of Saturn and Saab would have greatly limited GM’s future involvement and liability in both brands and would have been very attractive to GM. A Penske buy of Saab and Saturn might have worked if the Swedish government stepped in and provided guarantees.
Penske had everything going. Money, lots of dealerships (second largest in US), car credibility (racing and trucking empires). I wish Penske would have had an interest in Saab. And of course there already were lots of dealerships (especially in Canada) that sold both brands jointly.
I wish the Swedish government would make Penske an offer he couldn’t refuse. Until the doors actually shut, you never know.
Oh and regarding your question about Merbanco and Renco. They have no car experience. That has to greatly concern GM. It means the odds of having to take Saab back because of poor management greatly increases.
Sadly, Saab no longer fits GM’s core brands… this
six-decade-old brand was the embodiment of all automotive products manufacturers headquartered in
the heart of Sweden.
http://www.saab.com
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