General Motors Corp is in "intense" and "earnest" preparations for a possible bankruptcy filing, a source familiar with the company's plans told Reuters on Tuesday.
Vauxhall /Opel??? Will they be sacrificed as they looked to have to SAAB?
How will this affect other manufacturers who build cars in some cases jointly, in some cases ownership, in some cases technology with GM - Suzuki, Isuzu, Renault, Subaru............
|
Bankruptcy filing is not the same in the US as it is in the UK,
They can still continue to trade under those circumstances.
|
|
|
The world motor industry reminds me of those films of lakes during extreme droughts, when there's just a few muddy pools left with lots of fish flapping arround desperately.
What if the US government decided to save GM only to find that Ford hits the rocks in a few months' time and there's no money left to save them?
|
Who cares?
The cars were carp, they had no new ideas, their advertising was poor and the diesels were behind the curve. And their quality was good but not special. RIP I say.
|
|
I think the people of Elmesere Port might care!
|
|
Yes, absolutely, Rattle. Behind every story of a corporate downfall or the foolishness of bank bosses are thousands of people looking for new jobs and trying to make ends meet - all they did was an honest day's work.
|
|
|
|
"and the diesels were behind the curve."
Whats wrong with the GM/Fiat 1.9 range of diesel engines? I have one and find it very powerful, smooth (for a diesel) and reasonably economical?
|
|
The only purpose of a motor industry is to make cars of a kind and at a price that people want. Once people's demand for such cars has been satisfied, as now appears to be the case, there is no further need to use expensive resources making any more.
|
there is no further need to use expensive resources making any more.
Nice idea in theory, unfortunately we don't all live in Cuba where driving death traps with stinking engines is the norm. I don't think Cuba has too much of an issue with salt on the roads either.
You'll still need the odd new car as ones get written off, where will they come from? If you don't have mass production of cars then new ones will be too expensive to make for ordinary people and the value of the remaining cars will soar over time as they become less numerous.
In the end, without mass production (and consumption) our lifestyles would become unsustainable. It's the merry go round that keeps things working, without it we'll be looking at a standard of living not dissimilar to Victorian times, IMO.
|
We'll be looking at a standard of living not dissimilar to Victorian times
Sooner or later we shall have to accept the idea that the mad merry-go-round that you mention has certain disadvantages, and is Unsustainable, to use the trendy term. It would not be 100% bad if things became a bit more 'Victorian' - for instance having thousands of people driving a hundred miles a day just to get to and from their place of work.
|
Sadly, if we were unable to sustain the modern world and the consumerism that goes with it, I don't imagine we'd be able to pick and choose which things regress.
We might be able to do away with silly commutes, but life expectancy was only about 40 in Victorian Britain, with 15% of babies dead before they're 12 months old.
Not all of our modern society is so bad!
Motoring link: red flag act! Seemingly many councils are determined to bring it back, slowly but surely.
|
|
|
|
"I have one and find it very powerful..."
Me too. Apart from being a little unreliable, the performance and economy from the 1.9s was great. Nice and quiet too.
150bhp from 1.9L is comparable to the best. The twin-turbo version used by Saab knocks out 180bhp, not bad at all.
The Saab 9-3 1.9 TTiD with 94bhp per litre compares well to the BMW 123d with its 100 bhp per litre and makes the VAG 2.0 TDI 170 with just 85bhp per litre seem tame.
The new 2.0 CDTI will do 187bhp with twin-turbos, which is probably conservatively tuned, considering what these engines can do with a good re-map.
Edited by TheOilBurner on 09/04/2009 at 14:07
|
Usually when a company goes into receivership, then any company owned by it also goes into receivership.
So if GM goes into 'chapter 11 bankruptcy' as the American's put it, then you would expect Vauxhall / Opel to go into receivership.
This isn't always the case. When the (British) company that I worked went into receivership a few years ago, the receivers actually kept the Swiss part of the company out of receivership, as they thought it would be easier to sell.
Whatever happens, we're likely to see the break up of General Motors. And many would argue that it would be good for Vauxhall / Opel to be separate from GM.
|
As AE pointed out above, Chapter 11 is very different from receivership as we know it here. I don't know all the details, but my company went through it some years back, and in the States it enabled them to walk away from unwanted obligations (esp building leases) with no penalties. The company continued to trade worldwide, and I don't recall any significant difference to the way we did business in the UK (except the perennial cost cutting, and also having to persuade UK customers that we were not going bust).
From Wikipedia "Chapter 11 is reorganization, as opposed to liquidation. Debtors may "emerge" from a Chapter 11 bankruptcy within a few months or within several years, depending on the size and complexity of the bankruptcy"
|
Chapter 11 - A.K.A Get Out Of Jail Free card... :)
I'm sure there must be lots of conditions, but it seems to encourage poor long term planning for short term gains. Just the kind of thing Fat Cats love...
|
|
From what I recall, the whole process is controlled by the Courts so I don't think it's that easy to take unfair advantage. On the positive side, it's helped some companies return to profitability where over here they would have just gone to the wall. That (usually) has to be good for everyone IMO.
|
I posted on here some months ago that GMs principle aim at the moment is to remove the influence of the unions. If they can manage to get rid of some of their pension obligations then so much the better for them.
|
A key feature is that a company which goes into 'chapter 11 bankruptcy' in the USA or receivership here is insolvent. It can no longer pay its debts. The owners (shareholders) have lost everything.
The receivers have a duty to maximise the value of the outstanding assets to help pay off the debts.
For the company that I worked for, the receivers did decide there was a business worth saving. That still meant that half the employees were made redundant in the first two weeks (the taxpayer pays the redundancy for these).
Receivership is a harsh rapid process. But if there is a business worth saving, it will still be there, and it will be stronger. It is really an 'enforced restructuring'.
Should GM becme insolvent, then an independant Vauxhall / Opel would be quite likely.
|
I don't see how Opel can survive without GM. An example of this in my GM Corsa all the seat belts etc all have GM on them, now I bet a Caddy made at the same time would have the same buckles. If Opel became a car manufacturer in its own right it would not have access to the huge amount of parts GM has and would then suffer from an increase of production costs.
However I can see one of the eastern companies taking over Opel. Maybe AutoVaz-Opel oh the irony.
|
|
If GM continues to exist, I don't think anything would stop them selling the likes of Opel/Vauxhall (if anyone is interested...which is another matter) and still be supplier of parts.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Reading around the motoring press this week it seems Vauxhall/Opel (with help of their respective governments) intend to go it alone, with GM in the US only keeping a minority share.
|
|
|
