Saab and Volvo have been down this road before, back in the 1970s. In fact, the two Swedish automakers were a hair away from merging 240s and 900s back in the day, but instead followed separate paths. Now, with both brands facing difficult sales numbers and uncertain futures, Bob Lutz thinks a merger sounds good [...]
Damage control must be in full swing at General Motors these days with the recent announcement that Saab and Saturn are on the outs and Pontiac will forge on with a reduced product portfolio. Just yesterday, Susan Docherty, VP of Buick/Pontiac/GMC, published a post on GM’s Fastlane blog saying that “Pontiac is alive and kicking, [...]
This latest video of the Saab Performance Team is just as depressing as it is cool (additional helpings here and here). The cool part is obvious: when’s the last time you saw a guy put a yellow convertible on two wheels across a frozen lake and drive it with one hand on the wheel? Depressing [...]
New reports this afternoon indicate that Swedish tax authorities have effectively shut down Saab until the automaker pays back unpaid customs duties. Many of the parts that make up today’s Saabs are sourced from suppliers and General Motors plants outside of the European Union, and customs officials have halted the shipment of those parts. Without [...]
General Motors confirmed this morning that Saab’s days as a part of the Detroit-based company are numbered. The Swedish brand has filed paperwork with courts in its home country for reorganization that would lead to its independence. This self-managed reorganization is analogous to the U.S. Chapter 11 bankruptcy process, and would lead to the establishment [...]
General Motor’s hope that Saab might continue on as a standalone automaker in 2010 with a little financial assistance from the government of Sweden has hit a major snag. Sweden’s Enterprise and Energy Minister Maud Olofsson has said that she’s “deeply disappointed in General Motors,” and calls its actions “irresponsible.”
From what we can gather, there [...]
Despite an uncertain future, Saab will continue adding more product to its portfolio next month when it debuts the 2010 9-3X at the Geneva Motor Show. The 9-3X is a jacked up version of the 9-3 SportCombi that employs the Swedish brand’s Cross Wheel Drive (XWD) system that first debuted on the sporty Turbo X [...]
The Swedish Airplane Company, or Saab AB, has been building aircraft since 1937. To diversify its business, the company started making cars in the late 1940s. Whether we cringe or not, Saab Automobile (the car division) has always reminded the public that its cars have fighter jet DNA (e.g., “Born from Jets”). Now comes word [...]