The electric vehicle revolution has eaten another one of its children. “U.S. electric car manufacturer Miles Electric Vehicles filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy protection early on Tuesday, court documents showed, highlighting the difficulties faced by battery-powered vehicles in gaining wide market acceptance,” says Reuters. (Read More…)
Fisker has laid off nearly all of its rank and file employees. Reuters reports that 160 people were out of a job as of today, while 53 senior employees will stay on, apparently to help find a buyer for Fisker’s assets. Fisker is also hoping to re-negotiate a loan payment to the Department of Energy, due on April 22nd.
The 30 year run of Suzuki auto sales in the United States is one step closer to coming to an end, as a California bankruptcy court approved Suzuki’s restructuring plans.
NOTE: I received the following email from Saab Automobile Parts North America. As I was not aware of the recent details behind Saab’s parts/service operation (my bad) I felt obligated to share this, unedited, with everyone. – SM
Sajeev,
We read, with great interest, your latest Piston Slap post and the many comments in response to “The Last Saab = good Deal?” We wanted to take this opportunity to let you know about Saab Automobile Parts North America, the exclusive authorized provider of Saab Genuine Parts in North America. Venues like yours help us to get the message out that Saab Genuine Parts and Service are available. (Read More…)
Bruce writes:
I got my 2007 9-3 serviced at the Falls Church, VA Saab dealership. My question: They had new (2011) 9-5s for $20,000 off the sticker price. Almost half off. Are they a good deal? Would you buy one? (Read More…)
Only 6 dealers haven’t taken a buyout offer from Suzuki – of the 219 Suzuki dealers in America, 213 took the offer from American Suzuki, including the top 50 dealers by volume.
Being a Suzuki dealer is surely one of America’s least enviable jobs; franchise holders must choose whether to accept a cash settlement and a contract to provide parts and service in exchange for their franchises, or whether they want to fight the matter in court.
American Suzuki has received court approval to borrow $45 million to help restructure their dealer network following a Chapter 11 filing.
A couple of weeks ago the Wall Street Journal published an article about a “little-noticed” lawsuit in U.S. Bankruptcy Court filed by a trust representing “old” GM’s unsecured creditors. Those creditors are challenging a 2009 deal between GM Canada and a group of hedge funds that helped keep GM’s Canadian subsidiary out of its own bankrupcy. It’s a bit surprising to me that the WSJ article itself got very little notice in the automotive world because, if successful, the lawsuit could undo at least part of GM’s restructuring or result in a $1.3 billion price tag for the automaker. In regulatory filings GM has said its possible exposure will be less than that, $918 million, though in theory the bankruptcy court could reopen the entire bankruptcy, which would be much more disruptive to GM than just paying out a billion dollars.
“President Obama is proud of his bailout of General Motors. That’s good, because, if he wins a second term, he is probably going to have to bail GM out again.” Sounds like our august founder, Robert Farago, sounding off about American Leyland the New GM. Nope, it’s Forbes this time, and they come to bury the General, not to praise him.
The most successful brands in our industry don’t have much meaning to them.
Toyota, Chevrolet, Ford, Hyundai, Kia, all of these are names that wouldn’t evoke much of any imagery had their manufacturers never existed.
Mercury and Saturn are popular planets that make you think of space and the futuristic pursuit of those faraway places. Acura should be quite accurate and precise. Rams are tough. Infiniti pays homage to the outer limits of capability and performance.
Yet all of these names experienced failure, or ultimately failed, due to the key essential ingredient within any brand’s reputation.
Product.
A lawsuit filed by a Florida investor against General Motors over the age-old practice of “channel stuffing”, or sending inventory to dealers and recording it as a “sale”, so that revenue numbers can be pumped up while the vehicles languish on dealer lots. The practice of channel stuffing is universal in the auto industry, but in this case, the consequences are much broader.
According to media reports and TTAC, all kinds of high-powered parties are interested in sucking the last bone marrow out of the corpse of bankrupt Saab. China’s Youngman supposedly is ready to plunk down a billion Euro (or $1.3 billion) for the carcass. In Turkey, Brightwell Holdings “will make a bid very shortly, there’s no question,” as Brightwell board member Zamier Ahmen told Bloomberg. The trouble is: Nobody is bidding. (Read More…)
Want a piece of “quirky” history? While the good folks at the Church of the One True Saab still have dreams of white knights, Saab’s heritage is being auctioned off. This caught the attention of Bringatrailer.com (“The best vintage and classic cars for sale online.”) In a lengthy piece, the organ for trailer trash collector’s online hub salivates over “the entire collection of 100+ cars belonging to the Saab Heritage Museum in Trollhaettan, Sweden” to the liquidator. (Read More…)
Yesterday, the alleged enthusiast blog did play its usual “if we would tell you, they would shoot us” about a possible suitor from India:
“We are not allowed to reveal the identity of the company yet, but we are allowed to reveal some facts about it. They are of course based in India but acts on a world-wide basis with much more than 100’000 employees worldwide. They are a multi-billion dollar company, that work on multiple fields such as energy, logistics, real estate and of course within the aerospace and automotive industry.” (Read More…)
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