All Entries in the "SAAB" Category
Spyker: To See Profit, Saab Must Sell 100,000 of These Every Year
By Gunnar Heinrich
BUSINESSWEEK reported that Spyker is thinking that for Saab to see profits the Swedish-Dutch car maker will have to manufacture (and hopefully sell) 100,000 units per year.
Can this be done?
By virtue of Businessweek‘s own reporting, Saab sold 90K cars worldwide as early as 2008 and 120K cars in 2007, respectively.
So yes, if history is any guarantor, the 100K production figure is possible; provided parts pipelines flow smooth like e85.
But according to the BBC, Saab has not seen a profit since F.Y. 2001.
So, assuming that a) the economic conditions continue to improve into 2011 and that b) Saab’s production, marketing, and sales networks will all be in synch so that new 9-5s and 9-4Xs are hitting the streets en masse, SaabSpyker would still be deep in the hole even if it met its own production projections.
It isn’t readily conceivable how Spyker’s new/old entity can can build Saabs at less cost than GM which forced Saab to share platforms and design solutions with other divisions such as Opel.
To boot, Spyker must pay the General for many of its goods and services (read: parts) to Saab which will surely raise the company’s overhead. This, despite GM’s new status as SpykerSaab’s largest minority shareholder.
Short of outsourcing production to, say, Poland (à la Fiat) which would violate the Swedish government’s terms for backing Spyker’s acquisition loan, SaabSpyker will have to do some very inventive math to squeeze the efficiency out of an enterprise that spent the last decade hemorrhaging money.
All that gloom aside, if Victor Muller, Spyker’s tenacious Dutch CEO, was able to pull off this deal with GM despite incredible odds, surely we can’t rule out a second miracle: Saab’s return to sustainable profitability.
Saab Saved. GM Sells Saab To Spyker
By Gunnar Heinrich
HALLELUJAH! Bloomberg’s reporting that GM will sell Saab to Dutch car master Spyker! Oh, that Bloomberg, I could just hug…
Jan. 26 (Bloomberg) — General Motors Co. agreed to sell its Saab unit to Dutch sports-car maker Spyker Cars NV in a deal that would save the 72-year-old Swedish brand that’s being wound down.
Spyker agreed to pay $74 million in cash and $326 million in preferred shares in the company that would emerge from the deal, according to the Dutch company. The transaction, subject to Sweden agreeing to guarantee a 400 million-euro ($563 million) European Investment Bank loan for Saab, is expected to close in February and Saab will exit an orderly wind-down process in line with the timetable.
The automotive world is a richer community with Saab selling cars. Bring on the 9-5! And, please, please, please, the 9-1. Saab needs a smart hatch!
Spyker Announcement Re: Saab. Live Video Link
By Gunnar Heinrich
GOT this one courtesy SaabsUnited.com
Spyker’s set to hold a press conference which should take place in the Netherlands directly.
Here’s the link: www.rtl.nl
Saabists remember: if the sale with GM falls through, Genii Capital is reported to be waiting in the wings with a new offer.
It looks as though our dear Saab will find a new home!
Saab Sale Announcement Likely Today, Spyker Shares Up
By Gunnar Heinrich | IMG Flickr via SaabsUnited
MUM’S the word, but expect an announcement from the General or Spyker later today on the sale of Saab Automobile AB.
With the Saab community a-twitter, and some likely breathing into paper bags – including Spyker’s own CEO – the intense anticipation is palpable as negotiations with GM climax.
At the moment, trends are delicately positive. Spyker’s shares rocketed yesterday on the whiff of good news that the Dutch exotic manufacturer would pull it off.
According to Google Finance, if you bought early yesterday morning (AMS: SPYKR) and sold before trading halted, you would’ve pretty much doubled your money within eight hours.
Griffin Up New York! Save Saab Rally to Times Square
By Gunnar Heinrich
RECOGNIZING that the automotive world’s a better place with Saab in it, the following are the details for the upcoming Save Saab rally in New York that’s set to take place this Sunday, January 24th. At present, NOAA’s forecasting rain. But when did that ever stop committed Saabists?
Per SaabsUnited.com
The Save Saab New York Rally
Meet @ 10am: Exit 5S off the Palisades Parkway (near US Army Reserve, Orangeburg)
Depart for Times Square @ 11am. Arrive by noon.
The New York event will coincide with same-day rallies in Paris, Washington, Chicago, St Louis, and Denver. Visit SaabsUnited’s “Save Saab” page for further details on those events.
Griffin up!
Griffin Up! Saabists Rally For Their Marque
By Gunnar Heinrich
POSTED on SaabsUnited, there’s this jpeg which digitally displays a War-era British propaganda poster. Beneath the silhouette of the crown reads the succinct message:
Keep Calm And Carry On.
In case you haven’t noticed, what followed the multudinous epitaphs for the Swedish marque since GM announced closure last November was not a funeral but the sputterings of a car manufacturer that refused to die.
Saabists are having their Churchillian hour.
Like blitzed WWII Londoners staring the spectre of death bravely in the face, all the Saab party faithful can do is their symbolic part in making sure that the sun rises another day over an active Saab factory in Trollhattan, Sweden.
Anything at this point could tip the balance between Saab being snapped up for a heady $400-$500 million by some newly liquid buyer to Saab being shuttered along with GM’s other defunct divisions.
Pontiac, Saturn, Oldsmobile…
So that means public rallies to show support for Saab!
On Sunday, January 17th, rallies will be held around the world in demonstration of support from the Saab community for the embattled car maker.
In the US, there will be a rally in Brookline, Massachusetts at the Larz Anderson Museum from 10AM-5PM. The Facebook event page can be found here.
Event details for rallies in Norway, Denmark, Russia, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Australia, and China can be found here.
Surprised there’s not a Motown rally…yet.
The automotive world’s a better, more dynamic place with Saab selling cars in it. Let’s hope, fervently, that this 60 year old marque will not slip from us, lest our passions yield to the coming homogenization of all cars.
Griffin up!
Glimmers of Hope For Saab
- Saab future remains uncertain following Friday’s announcement
- Further purchase inquiries offer tenuous hope
- Waiting with baited breath
By Gunnar Heinrich | IMG GM
THE news on Friday was heartbreaking: GM would close Saab following multiple failed attempts to find a suitable buyer. But today, we have the further angst of not knowing the finality of Saab’s fate.
Hopes springs eternal.
GM Release on 12-20-2009
Following Friday’s announcement that GM will begin the orderly wind down of Saab, GM has received inquiries from several parties. We will evaluate each inquiry. We will not comment further until these evaluations have been completed.
I Dream of Saab
By Gunnar Heinrich| IMG Saab Automobile AB
SAD to know that what we’ve come to love cannot be forever.
To the Saabists out there – we few but passionate Svenska automobilists – my heart goes out to you on the eve of this terrible news.
Saab Automobile AB will now close after several botched attempts to find suitors.
Truthfully, Saab hasn’t been Saab for some years now. Since 2003, the 9-3 sedan (the bread ‘n butter of Saab’s smart portfolio) was sold as a rebadged Opel (generic as any midsize rental Euro car can get) streamlined in a mistaken quest to compete for BMW 3-Series and Audi A4 sales.
The 9-3 and the effort to drive Saab mainstream was but one of many tragic missteps by GM’s global brand of gross incompetance.
General Motors never understood Saab. Never wanted to, either.
Time and again Saab slipped the world clues as to the true capacity of their creativity despite the fiscal shackles that restrained it. The 9-1X a super techy and oh, so svelte hatchback that if priced in the $20K’s would’ve flattened BMW’s MINI. Even the new 9-5 seemed brimming with promise.
No one ever thought the Turbo X a credible alternative to an Audi S4 or a BMW M3. Nor could we reasonably contemplate purchasing a 9-3 SportCombi in place of a Volvo V70. The customers were very different, even if the price ranges were similar.
And therein lies the crux: Saab drifted away from what Saab did best – selling smart, sleek, turbocharged hatches. MINI has proven that there’s a market for quirky, upscale hatchbacks (even in America) and can now claim the market for its own.
Automotive enthusiasts everywhere have reason to morn tonight. For Saab, a company whose premise was building cars that are more than just appliances for getting us from points A to B, has died. And with it, a piece of the automotive soul.
Happy Saabing, Jan-Willem Vester
- Former Saab rep. Jan-Willem Vester has died
- Mr. Vester was a true gentleman and tremendous representation for GM
- Owned Saab 900 Convertible and Porsche 911
By Gunnar Heinrich | IMG Kevin Kusina for ADLX
JAN-WILLEM, or “Jay-Dubya” as his one time boss at SaabUSA called him, was a true car guy and an even truer gentleman.
Before joining GM’s press relations team for Saab, the gentle Dutchman wrote for European car mags and in his own garage: a mint, 80′s fresh 900 Convertible and a 993 gen. 911 Porsche.
What made Mr. Vester so effective was his character: devoid of any attitude, soft spoken, and clever in finding common ground.
For instance: recognizing that eventhough I owned a Saab convertible myself, my strongest interest centered on Mercedes-Benz, he regaled me one evening with a review he once conducted on the W140 gen. 600SEL.
With few exceptions, he was one of the finest car company representatives I’ve met. According to SaabsUnited, the auto industry is emptier today with news of his death.
One of Jan-Willem’s common sign-offs was “Happy Saabing”.
Happy Saabing, Jan-Willem.
