Dagens Industri is one of Sweden’s bigger newspapers and I think it’s fair to say that they’ve been pretty critical of Saab, GM and the entire sale process and outcome. They’ve definitely copped their right wack from this little corner of the blogosphere for it, too.
So when I saw an email in my inbox this morning saying they’ve published an interview with Victor Muller this weekend, I was definitely interested to see how it went.
Would they pepper him with their usual collection of negative questions or would he win them over with his energy and personality? Well, it seems they let Victor be Victor and the result is a portrait piece that conveys a lot of detail and a good picture of the man we’ve all got to know a little in the last four months.
I don’t believe for a second that this is the turning over of a new leaf for DI, but it’s nice to see.
Following is a googletrans, which is funky in parts but should convey the message reasonably well, over all.
Thanks to Matthias G for the tip…..
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DI Weekend: Bilfantast with talent who’s main asset
Victor Muller’s sense of business proved premature. His first car he bought with money he borrowed from his grandmother. Then he took a student loan, and bilsamlingen began to grow uncontrollably. If his recent car purchase, he says:
“We did it. Nobody believed in us. But we did it. ”
DI Weekend have met the new Saab owner.
After several weeks of reminders, a reply from Victor Muller: “I am vailable for an interview.”
A gråmulen day we meet as the Saab’s dreary office in Mölnlycke outside Gothenburg. Business – sales, marketing and design – has been moved to Trollhättan and a container near the entrance block. Photographer Anna Rönnqvist sighs and wonders how she is in this depressing environment to portray the man who managed the feat of buying Saab. We shake hands with Victor Muller and explain the problem.
“Okay, what do you suggest?” He says, and barely have time to ask the question before he asks that we go to Gothenburg and eat lunch.
Victor Muller is a long one and has never sat in the back seat of a Saab before. He thinks it’s a little too cramped for the legs as he climbs into the car.
“We have to do something about this,” he says half jokingly.
Victor Muller does not speak Swedish, but he can read the language fairly well.
“It is a right mild language only consists of about 30,000 words and sentence structure is similar to the Dutch.”
It is said that Victor Muller is enthusiastic, quick in the head, adept at business, analytical, charming, challenging and unique sustainable. He loves cars and boats. At home in the garage, he has 15 exclusive cars – Aston Martin, Ferrari, Lancia, Maserati and Rolls-Royce from before World War II.
He has five boats, including the Riva Super Aquarama 1971, a Dutch-built boat and a 116 foot luxury yacht – a classic beauty built in 1967 to the media magnate Malcolm Forbes. She is located in Fort Lauderdale and Victor Muller has not had time to be there since August last year.
“It is totally sick. Totally sick, “said Victor Muller, who often emphasizes that he means by saying it twice.
“I must go there soon and see if she stays.”
Victor Muller also love beautiful things. On the wrist shine a big bell of the Roger Dubuis brand.
“There is a small manufacturer in Switzerland, which only makes 28 copies of each clock. I love collecting stuff. I love Italian cars, I love sports cars, I love racing. ”
The suit is dark with narrow stripes in blue. He lets sew up their costumes in a small skräddarfirma in London that he refuses to divulge the name of “because it would be rush hour there” and he himself would have to wait for ages next time he needs a suit. On cufflinks shows a representation of a baby. It is his youngest child, Valentin, soon eleven months.
Victor Muller has five children, “the official two wives,” as he puts it. I said that I have four – no wives, no children. He looks surprised at me and says:
“It must be interesting. Four children, and with your job? ”
“But you’ve got five, and with your job,” I counter.
“Yes, but I do not need to be there every day. With the life I live, I would never manage to raise children that way. It would just not go. I live close, but these last three months have been, even for my standards, extreme. ”
Victor Muller, decided early on that his life would be anything but boring. And he has not had a single dull day since he started working, “he says.
