Reflections on JAJ’s decision
March 25, 2011 in Editorial
There has been a lot of speculation and comments in the media regarding Jan-Åke’s decision to leave his post at SAAB.
E24, like always, bring in their “german expert” who of course tells the doomsday story about SAAB losing money and Spyker having no money left. With the words “It will take a miracle” they describe the german expert: Ferdinand Dudenhöffer’s opinions about SAAB. Well, we all know, and have known, his feelings about SAAB and one can only ask if he is trying to promote the german brands by talking trash about others? He has so many questions about SAAB and while reading the article I sort of get the feeling that he is short-sighted, he can only see one solution to a problem and does not understand that things can be handled in different ways… The fact that he is a professor does not strike me as impressive or make him an “expert” in any way. Things change, the world is changing and I don’t think he can actually see that…
Here is a translation from the article:
He has said it before and he is saying it again: SAAB will not survive in the medium to long term. Todays news that the last swede in SAAB’s managment team, CEO Jan-Åke Jonsson, who is now leaving SAAB is a tough beat for the company, but it is not a deciding factor for the car manufacturers future. Swedish CEO or not. It will take a miracle to save SAAB and I dont know any CEO who achieves real miracles, say Ferdinand Dudenhöffer, who is a professor in auto-economics at Duisburg-Essen university. After Jan-Åke Jonsson take leave the SAAB owner and Spyker Cars chairman Viktor Muller, is now to take charge of the SAAB “car” with two steering-wheels. As CEO and Chairman. Does he and Spyker have the competence to develop SAAB and reach the goal of break-even numbers by 2012?
- What Muller does as CEO for Spyker is a smaller market. Thinking about SAAB he needs to compete with larger volumes and newer models which is a completely different world. He might be able to keep going for a while, but not in the long run.
Last year Spyker Cars sold 31 696 cars, which in a way is an increase with 15% compared with 2009 but in a totally different league than the competition in the market where SAAB is acting.
- Even if SAAB reaches 50-100’000 cars, its not enough. They have to double the prices to be profitable say Ferdinand Dudenhöffer.
The professors prognosis is that the customers are running away from SAAB since SAAB falls between two chairs. The company can not reach the volumes and advantages to compete in the premium-segment with Volvo, BMW or Audi. SAAB/Spyker is not exotic enough to compete with Ferrari, Aston Martin or Lamborghini.
- I think SAAB is being erased step by step. They must manage large costs to turn the structure around. Spyker has no experience in developing 300-400 000 cars, they have neither suppliers, production, design, sales or the engineers for such manufacturing say Ferdinand Dudenhöffer.
I find it absolutely amazing that he can make such assumptions without even having seen the businessplan and to my knowledge ever even sat foot in Trollhättan or seen any of SAAB’s facilities and most important of all: never understood the “saab-spirit” of the people working there.
I have been following SAAB for the last 12 years, also worked at the company for more than a year, also know so many people there, read all the books written about SAAB and my opinion in all of this is absolutely clear: I don’t think JAJ would leave SAAB and let all his hard work go down the drain, if he didn’t feel at ease about SAAB’s current situation and that SAAB will, “as so elegantly said by Mr Spock in Star Trek”, live long and prosper 
We thank you Jan-Åke for your fantastic work with SAAB and we at SaabsUnited, hope to get the chance to speak to you about your time at SAAB sometime in the near future!
Björn said on March 26, 2011
Well, I must place a small comment: I got so tired of all these so-called “experts” showing up on TV’s and newspaper. They are NEVER taking the risk of industrial entrepreneurship and most of the time they try to satifsfy their narcissistic needs while explaining what other experts earlier have said would never happen. They have never any respect what other people do. Would have any “expert” expected a couple of months ago what happen in the Arabian world? (well somehow off-topic but I hope you get the point…).
.
BTW: I will get my new Saab 9-3 TTid SC in a few days (on April 5th, my birthday
JH said on March 26, 2011
Very well written! Most of these “experts” just seems to be experts on throwing bullshit.
By the way, congratulations to your new Saab birthday present!
100%Saab said on March 26, 2011
I am sorry to see JAJ retire. Recently, he has looked tired in some of his photos.
He will be missed! I look forward to reading his book.
Just a thought.
sad said on March 26, 2011
Well, this is swedish news…. but it comes from an earlier saab supporter JAJ quits because of muller… unfortunately this article looks fairly serious… saying how there was glitch between them and muller acting to cocky towards him. Hope this has no truth to it!
Rune said on March 26, 2011
I will have to go with my gut feeling on this, and say that what Robert Collin speculated about simply is not true.
Nearly a year ago, di.se speculated that JÅJ would defect to Ovlov (http://www.saabsunited.com/2010/06/report-jan-ake-jonsson-being-courted-by-volvo.html). If JÅJ had such a hard time with VM, then would he not have grabbed that opportunity with both hands?
It just does not add up.
…but then again, very few thing of what the Swedish media serves us seems to add up. I guess we get what we pay for. Reading news on the Internet is free.
The simplest explanation is that JÅJ has been through a lot and wants to spend more time with his family in Stockholm (a long way from THN btw). I suggest we stick to the simple explanations until further evidence is presented.
JH said on March 26, 2011
That is absolute bullshit in my opinion. If true, both Jan-Åke and Victor would have been lying when they said that there was no conflict behind this decision, and I DO NOT think of them as liars. We have no reason whatsoever to disbelieve in what they are saying. I find it sad that Jan-Åke retires but still very understandable since he has had a very hard job over the last few years and needs to relax.
Jason Powell said on March 27, 2011
I think STAR magazine does the writing for the Swedish press. Make a story where there is no story. JAJ is the type of man that cares so much about the brand and the people that work for it that if the ship was sinking as I’ve read, he would go down with the ship and do everything he could to save it again. I think that timing is right and that he has done what he set out to do in saving and reviving the brand. Great job JAJ.
khrisdk said on March 27, 2011
Fun fact of the day:
The headmaster of Copenhagen Business School, the institution where Christer Karlsson in employed has just been fired because of an illegal fusion with SIMI.
They kept the problem hidden, and have left the latest MBA graduates with a useless MBA
Time to quote Christer:
” I have lost all trust in the Management”
Could this lead to bankrupcy for CBS
TTAero said on March 27, 2011
That is funny!
ivo 71 said on March 27, 2011
No, it’s not, not really. Actually, it’s pretty sad imho, the CBS is not a bad school at all. But perhaps we could conjure up an expert to comment on it?
Ivo