Car Manufacturer News
Saab Might Live On Thanks To Asian Investors
Zombie Saab continues to live on, thanks to the news that two Asian investors are potentially on board. The news comes after National Electric Vehicle Sweden AB (NEVS for short) which is Saab’s parent company, announced in August that it was not able to repay numerous debts and was seeking bankruptcy protection in Sweden.
The first investor is an unnamed Chinese automaker that came on board for the whole deal just on Sunday, according to Automotive News. That company plans to buy a majority stake in NEVS and will also pay operating expenses until the whole agreement is officially finalized in the early part of 2015. That means NEVS no longer will have the wolves waiting outside its door, which also means Saab will not have to be shuttered once and for all.
Adding to the good news is the announcement from NEVS that a second Asian manufacturer, which is also anonymous for the time being, will be helping with developing new vehicles. Considering that the current 9-3 and 9-5 have aged considerably, such a move is absolutely necessary if Saab hopes to carve out any type of future in the market. The joint venture is still not finalized, so anything could happen with it as this point.
Shedding some light on the identity of the two unnamed manufacturers is a report from Svenska Dagbladet, which is a Swedish newspaper. Back in August it claimed that NEVS was meeting with Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. from India and Dongfeng Motor Corp. from China in an attempt to bring in outside funding. Whether those are the same companies that are getting serious with NEVS right now or not isn’t clear at this time.
Before anyone laughs at the idea of more Asia investors getting involved with Saab, one only has to look at the recent changes with fellow Swedish automaker Volvo to see that such an arrangement can produce beautiful results. For now, though, the only thing that’s certain about Saab is that its future is uncertain.
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