Dagens Industri will feature a full interview with Augie Fabela on the Saab deal in tomorrow’s edition (I don’t know if it will be online) but they’ve pre-empted this with a story about the deal, featuring some snippets of that interview.
The following is a full translation that was done for Saabs United by Carl-Henrik B. My thanks to Carl-Henrik!
It’s nice to see them accentuating the positive in the headline…..not.
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“Still the billions missing in the Saab-deal”.
Updated: 2009-08-17 at 23.05.
Koenigsegg Group has signed a binding agreement with GM to buy Saab, reveals Koenigsegg Group chairman Augie K Fabel to Dagens Industri. He states that still there is 3 billion Swedish kronor (about 400 million USD) missing in financing.
After eight weeks of negotiations the parties have come to an agreement, states Augie K Fabela in an interview with Dagens Industri. According to other mediasources the deal will be presented during Tuesday. General Motors shall continue to act as a stakeholder in Saab and get preferences-shares with rights to dividends in the new Saab.
GM puts 2,8 billion SEK in preference-shares and together with an expected loan from the EIB of 4,3 billion SEK it’s about 3 billion to finish the deal.
“In a normal macro-economic world, it would have been easy to get banks to finance this. But in today’s world they do not” – says Augie K Fabela to the newspaper. Augie K Fabela reveals that he personally invests but doesn’t say by how much.
Koenigsegg Group shall invest 720 million SEK, writes the newspaper and refers to data from Saab in Trollhättan. The Norwegian Bård Eker and Christian von Koenigsegg also contribute with straws to the stack.
Any information from Saab Automobile in Trollhättan is not possible to get this evening.
The first comments will be provided by GM, and it is GM that determine when information should be provided” said Eric Geers, Information Manager at Saab Automobile, to TT (Swedish News Agency).
The reconstruction of Saab Automobile began in February after the owner General Motors stated that it takes it’s hand away from the Swedish company by the end of the year. According to a decision in Vänersborgs District Court the reconstruction should be finished on Thursday. If the deal between Koenigsegg Group and GM isn’t totally finished by then, the company can apply for an extended time period.
With the stock transfer agreement, which now appears to be the signed, Saab would be able to get out of reconstruction, which has meant that the company has had its debts to creditors forgiven by 75 percent. But parts of the funding thus remains still to be resolved. Saab’s application for a loan from the European Investment Bank (EIB) assumed that Saab must have government loan guarantees, and negotiations are underway with Riksgälden and the government must bless Saab’s business plan. The Board of Directorrs for the Bank (EIB) should consider the request September 22.
Augie K Fabela says that it received a clear support of the request for government guarantee from those involved in the issue by the government. We also recieved support from the government after our meeting last Tuesday with Secretary of State Jöran Hägglund,” says Fabel in the interview. TT searched during the Monday evening Jöran Hägglund (C), but he would not make any comments at that time.
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