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OK, Let's play!
But, let's remember some of the ground rules of playing the GM game. Historically, GM was always somewhat unique among car companies in that each division stood alone from a marketing standpoint. The most successful divisions (Chevrolet, Pontiac) got the most $$$ and the unsuccessful divisions (Oldsmobile) eventually get axed. It wasn't until recently (last 20 years or so) that Ford or Chrysler tried to make their divisions (Mercury, Plymouth, etc.) full range car companies. Old GM has been doing this since the 1920's, with the possible exception of Cadillac.
Back in 1990, when GM bought in, Saab became a player in this game. Since their volume was so small, very little corporate marketing money was spent on product planning. That was left to the Swedes.
Once GM bought the rest of Saab, it's fully integrated in to this system. So, now Saab has to compete within GM for resources against the other automotive divisions. Saab is truly David fighting the Chevrolet Goliath.
GM knew that in order for Saab to complete, they were going to have to lower prices and expand the product line in order to make the brand profitable in the long term. The new 9-3 and 9-5 were already in the pipeline at that point with nothing else on the horizon. So they are taking their beating now, with the idea of profitablilty in the future with low developmental cost rebadged (Subuaru and GMC) vehicles.
Even if GM would drop in the billion or so to develop new "purely Saab" cars, it would take a long time to bring such new cars to market. Also, would the Trollhatten factory be able to handle at least 2 new assembly lines?
So GM is doing what I think is the only alternative that makes any sense --rebadging other GM cars as Saabs, while using Saab's techonology in other cars like Saturn. If this is successful, maybe it will make sense to open new Swedish factories and build real Saabs. I doubt it, given the high costs of operating in Sweden, but you never know.
I've read two very critical articles saying the GM has destroyed the "Saabishness" of their vehicles. GM and Saab can no longer afford to be the quirky car company. I know there are some purists that demand that the character of the original 99 be preserved in all future Saabs, but there are not enough of them to ensure the future viability of the brand here or in Europe. My biggest fear is that if the 9-2 and 9-7 are unsuccessful, GM will pull the plug, close the assembly line, and Saab will become a supplier of turbo engines to Opel and Saturn.
We won't have much to write about then, will we?
gatorcpa
'03 9-3 convertible
posted by 167.219....
, Thu, 21 Aug 2003 10:46:58
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