Another piece of great product news is out today. Safety is, of course, one of our brand pillars so it’s great to see our newest vehicle, the Saab 9-4x, fitting in with the family ethos. – SW
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The new Saab 9-4X crossover has earned ‘Top Safety Pick’, the highest rating for crashworthiness awarded by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) in the United States. Only three weeks ago, the Saab 9-5 Sedan received the same accolade.
“To achieve two Top Safety Picks in three weeks is, of course, extremely gratifying,” says Per Lenhoff, Head of Safety Development at Saab Automobile. “Our main priority is always the protection of real people in real accidents, but the IIHS tests are a valuable guide for consumers and it is important for us to achieve good results.”
IIHS is a research and communications organization funded by auto insurers in the US. The test procedures include front impact (offset) and side impact crashes. Seat/head restraints are also tested in a simulated rear-end impact to assess protection against whiplash injuries and the roof structure is tested to assess vehicle rollover protection.
Performance is rated as ’Good’, ’Acceptable’, ’Marginal’ or ’Poor’ in each of the tests and to achieve the ’Top Safety Pick’ award, cars must achieve the highest rating in all four procedures and should also be fitted with ESP®.
The Saab-webosphere is ticking over with news about the EIB approving our deal to sell and leaseback property. So why no press release from Saab yet? Well, there’s more than just the EIB involved in the approvals process and we have to wait on all parties before the deal is officially announced. We will do so in due course providing all goes well.
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SaabLog-in has some great Saab-Spyker photos from the Goodwood Festival of Speed. The pics include the first Spyker concept vehicle from 1996 (let’s just say evolution is a wonderful thing IMHO).
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My first Saab experience was with a Saab 9000 from the mid 1980s. I was really pleased when I got in touch again with the owner of that car, an old friend of mine named Nathan. I was even more pleased to find out that he’s still a Saab nut after all these years and I’m going to catch up with him when I’m next in Australia and check out his very hot Saab 9000 Aero.
But back to the mid-1980s…..
If you had a Saab of that vintage then you’re going to enjoy this retrospective on the 1986 Saab 9000 from Hemmings. It’s hard to imagine the 9000 as approaching any sort of vintage status, but I guess it is. Like the best of us 🙂
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If your Saab-ish passions run a little deeper (i.e. older), then this look at a family and their Saab experiences might be more up your alley.
The guy at the center of the story, Tom Shehan, is pretty typical of the average long-term Saab nut. Either that, or he’s the guy that all Saab nuts would like to be: with a 96 in the garage and a Sonett under restoration.
If you read just one story from this Saabosphere post – make it this one.
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Our friends on the Best of the Road tour around the US certainly seem to be visiting some interesting places. Any town with a giant Superman statue is cool place….
The Saabs have been seeing some action, too…..
Make sure you check into the Best of the Road website and check in on where the teams are visiting.
Right now Captain and Clark are (fittingly) in Clarksville TN, Jules and Joan have just visited Santa Claus (the town, not the person), the Wynns have just left Nagodoches, the Fun Finders have been visiting Rand and McNally’s HQ and the McNavigators have been to Marco Island, FL.
Saab have made several announcements in regard to deals made with Chinese companies Pang Da and Youngman since mid-May. These deals have changed slightly in nature as each new announcement has been made and I thought it might be useful for those interested in Saab business to track the dynamic nature of the deals.
Please note that these are just dot-point summaries and not detailed examinations of the conditions associated with each deal. They are treated this way to quickly and easily present significant changes to the deals where these have occurred.
Memorandum of Understanding signed with Pang Da (non-binding)
Includes a strategic alliance consisting of a 50/50 distribution joint venture (DJV)
includes provision for a manufacturing joint venture (MJV) for Saab branded vehicles as well as for an MJV-owned brand (the so-called ‘child brand’) in China.
Saab Automobile will have up to 50 percent in the MJV, with Pang Da and a to-be-selected manufacturing partner owning the remaining shares.
Pang Da purchase 30million Euros worth of vehicles with an option to purchase 15mil Euro more within 30 days.
Pang Da to take 24% stake in Spyker (subsequently renamed Swedish Automobile) valued at 65mil Euros
Youngman to take 29.9% ownership interest in Swedish Automobile, valued at 136mil Euros
Pang Da retain their right to a 24% ownership interest, however the cost of this 24% investment by Pang Da is raised from 65mil Euros to 109mil Euros because of additional equity to be contributed by Youngman.
Distribution joint venture moves from 50/50 between Saab and Pang Da under the initial agreement to a tripartite DJV – Saab 33%, Youngman 33% and Pang Da 34%
Manufacturing joint venture conditions change to see Saab Automobile and Youngman each have a 45% interest (Saab was to have a 50% interest under the initial agreement) and Pang Da hold the remaining 10%.
MoU is subject to conditions before being confirmed as a binding agreement. Agreement will be subject to regulatory approvals in Sweden and China.
Equity components of previous MoU now converted to binding agreements. These are still subject to regulatory approval, which all parties are working on and expect to receive in coming months.
Parties continue working towards execution of binding agreements for a strategic alliance consisting of a tripartite distribution joint venture and a tripartite manufacturing joint venture for Saab-branded and child brand vehicles in China.
Saab and Youngman make conditional agreement on a 50/50 new product joint venture (NPJV) that will see three new models developed – identified as Saab 9-1, Saab 9-6 and Saab 9-7. Saab will contribute design, development and testing expertise and Youngman will contribute finance.
Agreement on NPJV is also dependent on regulatory approvals, which is expected in a timely manner.
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I hope that helps to clear up the nature and current status of the deals, which have steadily increased Saab’s partnership with Pang Da and Youngman. As noted in the most recent release on July 4, this broad base and increased co-operation is expected to provide better conditions for the entry of Vladimir Antonov into the ownership group, which will only further increase Saab’s stability into the future.
Almedalen Week is an annual political and interest group love-in held in picturesque Visby, on the island of Gotland off Sweden’s east coast.
During this year’s Almedalen Week there will be a display of electric vehicles, and of course the Saab 9-3 ePower will be included in that display. Moreover there will also be two more Saab 9-3 ePower vehicles available for people attending the event to take for a test drive (or more accurately, be taken for a test drive – only Saab staff at Almedalen are allowed to drive but visitors can go for a ride).
This is not the first time an electric Saab 9-3 has graced Almedalen Week. In fact, the Saab 9-3 ePower’s genesis in the form of the True Electric 9-3 Convertible was on display at the show back in 2009.
The Saab 9-3 ePower is a collaboration between Saab Automobile, Boston power (battery partner), Electro Engine (battery management), Innovatum (project management) and Power Circle (electrical expertise). You can also see a background article on the construction of these zero emissions vehicles, which are based on the Saab 9-3 SportCombi.
The Saab 9-3 ePower vehicles will be on display at Almedalen Week from July 3 to 7 and whilst we’re not there personally, we will try to bring you more coverage from Almedalen this week.
Trollhättan, Sweden: Swedish Automobile N.V. (SWAN) and Saab Automobile AB (Saab Automobile) today announced the signing of final agreements with Pang Da Automobile Trade Co., Ltd. (Pang Da) and Zhejiang Youngman Lotus Automobile Co., Ltd. (Youngman), thereby converting the non-binding memorandum of understanding relating to the equity investment of Pang Da and Youngman announced on 13 June 2011 into binding agreements subject to regulatory and other third party approvals. Moreover, Saab Automobile announces a conditional agreement with Zhejiang Youngman Passenger Car Group Co., Ltd. (Youngman Passenger Car) on the formation of a Sweden-based joint venture company for the development of three new product Saab models (NPJV).
The non-binding MOU announced on 13 June 2011 between SWAN, Saab Automobile, Pang Da and Youngman in terms of which Pang Da and Youngman will make an equity investment in the total aggregate amount of EUR 245 million in SWAN have now been incorporated in binding agreements, while the parties continue working towards execution of binding agreements for a strategic alliance consisting of a tripartite distribution joint venture and a tripartite manufacturing joint venture for Saab-branded and child brand vehicles in China. The agreements are subject to approval from relevant authorities. The agreements allow for the return of Mr. Vladimir Antonov as a shareholder/financier of SWAN and Saab Automobile which the parties expect as soon as the parties at interest have cleared him.
The NPJV will be 50 percent owned by Saab Automobile and 50 percent by Youngman Passenger Car, and forms the foundation for an expansion of the Saab product portfolio with three models which until now did not form part of Saab Automobile’s current and future product portfolio. As such the NPJV will focus on developing three completely new Saab vehicles: the Saab ‘9-1’, Saab ‘9-6’ and Saab ‘9-7’.
Within the development process of these three new vehicle lines, Saab Automobile will be responsible for controlling and managing the design, the development and testing process to the start of production and providing other necessary technical and quality control support. For this, Saab Automobile will source existing capabilities and expertise from its state-of-the-art technical development department in Trollhättan. Youngman Passenger Car will be responsible for providing the necessary financial investments in the joint venture.
The agreement on NPJV is also subject to approval from relevant authorities, which SWAN, Saab Automobile and Youngman Passenger Car hope to obtain timely.
Victor Muller, CEO of SWAN and Saab Automobile said: “I am pleased to announce the signing of binding agreements (subject to obtaining regulatory approvals) with Pang Da and Youngman, as it underlines the confidence of all parties in a successful tripartite partnership. Establishing the New Product Joint Venture is a major step for both Saab Automobile and Youngman Passenger Car and marks the start of an exciting new partnership. This joint venture offers Saab Automobile the opportunity to develop models that were not envisaged nor funded in our original business plan: for instance, we will now be able to develop a small entry level Saab, a car that has long been on the top of our wish list.”
Mr. Pang Qingnian, CEO of Youngman, added: “The agreement on the New Product Joint Venture brings together the best of both worlds, merging the industrial and financial strength of Youngman Passenger Car with the state-of-the-art technical expertise of Saab Automobile. The Saab ‘9-6X’ and Saab ‘9-7’ will be key to enhancing the prestige of the Saab brand to an even larger group of customers in China and the US, while the entry level Saab ‘9-1’ will appeal to urban motorists around the globe.”
Mr. Pang Qinghua, CEO of Pang Da, commented: “I am very happy to have signed binding agreements with our partners, which further feeds my confidence in a successful future for Saab Automobile. We were already impressed with Saab’s current and planned product portfolio to date and with the addition of three new Saab models, the brand will be even better positioned to meet demand in markets around the world and China in particular.
Last night I tweeted a special message to a good friend of mine in Tennessee. Mike used to write with me on my old website, Saabs United, and one of the Best of the Road teams was calling into his town – Franklin, TN.
The McNavigators had mentioned the following on Twitter:
We are all checked into our new home for 2 nights @countryinns and we’re minutes away from hitting the town. Get ready Franklin TN
Knowing that that’s Mike’s hometown now, I re-tweeted and marked it to his attention. Sure enough, Mike spotted the McNavigators’ Saab 9-5 in downtown Franklin and snapped a quick cellphone picture to prove it:
@Inside_saab #Saab 9-5 driven by the @McNavigators spotted in downtown #FranklinTN!! W00t!
The McNavigators also mentioned that they were running a little late for their day’s program as they had to stop and take a few Saab enthusiasts for a tour around their 9-5:
Running late to town hall, had to give two @Saab enthusiasts a tour of the 9 5! They are sold!
The lesson here……
The Best of the Road crews are out and about, touring the US. If you see them, go up and say “Hi”, maybe even get a photo with them. I’m sure they’d love to meet up with you and we’d love to share your meeting here on site so if you get a photo, make sure you send it in.
Here are the towns they’re visiting. Keep up with them on either the Best of the Road website or their Twitter accounts and you’ll get a good real-time feed of where they’re heading (that “Best of the Road” link features a real-time map).
Note: the locations below are not in the order in which they’ll be visited.
Captain and Clark Category: Most patriotic Locations: Clarksville TN, Emporia KS, Fort Leonard Wood MO, Peachtree City GA, Rapid City SD, Williamsburg VA
The Fun Finders Category: Best for food. Locations: Addison WV, Burnsville MN, Costa Mesa CA, Gulfport FL, Lafayette LA, Visalia CA
TravelingJules and TravelingJoan Category: Most Fun. Locations: Glenwood Springs CO, Myrtle Beach SC, Santa Claus IN, Sioux City IA, Vacaville CA, Yellow Springs OH
Gone with the Wynns Category: Friendliest town. Locations: Lake Havasu AZ, Mount Airy NC, Nacogdoches TX, Valdosta GA, Walla Walla WA, Woodward OK
The McNavigators Category: Most beautiful Locations: Baker City OR, Coral Gables FL, Franklin TN, Marco Island FL, Pacifica CA, Sandpoint ID
Trollhättan, Sweden: Saab Automobile will support the Nils Liedholm Cup this year through a personal donation by recently retired CEO Jan Åke Jonsson. The Nils Liedholm Cup is an annual Swedish youth football tournament for boys and girls between 13 and 16 years of age, with this year’s edition starting on June 30. The tournament, named after Swedish football legend Nils Liedholm, is held in Valdemarsvik, a town around 200 km south of Stockholm on the Swedish east coast.
In 2010, Jan Åke Jonsson received an annual award for business leadership from the Svensk Chefsförening, an association for Swedish business leaders, which included a 20,000 SEK prize. This prize was offered as a personal donation to the 2011 Nils Liedholm Cup by Jonsson. Just like Liedholm, Jonsson is a native of Valdemarsvik and this common heritage has much to do with Saab Automobile’s involvement as a sponsor of this year’s edition of the tournament.
As CEO of Saab Automobile during the turbulent process through which the company was sold to Spyker Cars early in 2010, Jonsson was praised by the Svensk Chefsförening as a leader for his determination, patience and commitment. Jonsson readily acknowledges the contributions that team sport and the disciplines learned through this in his early life made to his professional life as a business leader. “That is why Saab Automobile and I decided last year to make a donation to this event, in the hope that participants in the 2011 Nils Liedholm Cup will learn and apply the same lessons in their lives,” says Jonsson.
For those who are unfamiliar with Liedholm: he is generally regarded as one of the all-time greats of Swedish and, arguably, international football. He played 23 times for the Swedish national team, winning an Olympic gold medal in 1948 and leading the Swedish team that finished second in the 1958 World Cup. On club level, Liedholm celebrated his biggest successes with Italian giants AC Milan, where he signed in 1949 and formed an all-Swedish attacking line-up with two other prominent Swedish footballers of that period – Gunnar Gren and Gunnar Nordahl. After his playing career, Liedholm coached Italian football teams successfully for several years, winning Italian championships with both AC Milan and AS Roma.
As said, the Nils Liedholm Cup is a special event for Saab Automobile and more in particular for Jonsson, who retired on May 19 of this year after 40 years with the company. Jonsson is a football enthusiast to this very day and grew up in the 1950s and 1960s in Valdemarsvik, idolising his local hero. And in the early 1960s, Jonsson got the chance to meet Liedholm.
A young Jan-Åke Jonsson (center) meets his footballing idol.
“It was in 1962 or 1963, I don’t remember exactly anymore. I was around 12 years old,” Jonsson recalls. “Word spread in the local newspaper that Nils Liedholm was briefly back in town, and naturally we all knew where the Liedholm family home was located. So I and two friends headed for Liedholm’s house in order to meet our idol.”
Jonsson and his friends managed to get an audience with Liedholm, and a photographer of the local newspaper who was also present shot a few images of the gathering. “A few weeks later, I received a photo from the meeting in the mail, sent to me by the photographer.” Jonsson decided to forward the photo to Liedholm’s address in Italy, asking him to sign it. Liedholm obliged, and also sent Jonsson the autographs of all his team members at AC Milan.
“I’ve kept the photo ever since,” says Jonsson. “It’s a wonderful memory to a special moment. Liedholm was not only my idol because of his football skills, but also because of what he embodied: his was a mentality of hard work, determination, leadership and full commitment to his profession. He taught me the importance of these values and showed that you can reach the highest heights if you stay focused on your goals.”
Trollhättan, Sweden: Swedish Automobile N.V. (SWAN) announces that it entered into a EUR 25 million convertible bridge loan agreement with Gemini Investment Fund Limited (Gemini), thereby securing additional short-term funding.
SWAN entered into a EUR 25 million convertible bridge loan agreement with Gemini with a 6 months maturity. The interest rate of the loan is 10% per annum and the conversion price is EUR 1.38 per share (the volume weighted average price over the past 10 trading days). SWAN may at any time during the loan’s term redeem it without penalty and it intends to do so once the funding from Pang Da and Youngman is received, in which case no dilution as a result of this bridge loan will occur.
Upon receipt of Gemini’s EUR 25 million and upon reaching agreements with its suppliers on payment terms, Saab Automobile hopes to complete its scheduled loan drawdown of EUR 29.1 million from the European Investment Bank (EIB).
As a result of this convertible bridge loan (EUR 25 million), the sale of the real estate (EUR 28 million) and the sale of cars to a Chinese buyer (EUR 13 million), Saab Automobile (conditionally) secured EUR 66 million in additional funding this week. Assuming the receipt of these funds takes place as scheduled, Saab Automobile expects to have secured the liquidity required to restart production hopefully within 2 weeks, subject to reaching agreement with its suppliers which includes feasible delivery schedules.
Victor Muller, CEO of Swedish Automobile and chairman of Saab Automobile said: “I am relieved to report that we made the June salary payments this afternoon from the proceeds of the sale of cars we announced last Monday. We again extend our sincerest apologies to our employees for the hardship the late payment has caused to them. We have clearly gone through a very rough patch in the past few weeks and hopefully we can now reach agreement with our suppliers so as to ensure a resumption of our production in a controlled way. Our mid and long-term funding is secured by the Pang Da /Youngman agreements which are still subject to obtaining certain governmental approvals. Assuming these approvals are obtained, the Gemini bridge loan will be repaid in full.”
Things appeared quite bleak for Saab last Friday when I wrote that piece and the event that inspired it – the non-payment of staff in a timely manner – is not an event that anyone wants to even think about repeating. Whilst there were various developments in the pipeline, they were in the pipeline and of course, we couldn’t talk about them until they were done. As we’ve learned from press releases in the last few days, there are (quote) “no assurances” that discussion will be fruitful because we seem to face obstacles at every turn so we have to be very cautious when it comes to statements about the future.
Things have got done, however. We have a new order for vehicles that will provide immediate liquidity relief to pay staff (and more), and we have a conditional agreement in place for the sale and leaseback of our property. More is needed and there will be more to come, but the important thing is that the wheels are moving and with some co-operation from people in high places they will continue to move. We can then get back to doing what we’re here for – making Saabs.
For me, it’ll be a welcome return to home base. As I wrote last week, it’s been very difficult to be away from Saab HQ and my colleagues there in this difficult time. We have a huge job to do, to get things moving again and that’s not just in the factory, but in the marketplace as well.
As happened when Saab were being sold by GM, there has been a whole heap of news about Saab in the press, but the vast majority of it has been negative news. No matter what actions we have in place to overcome obstacles (i.e good news) the focus is always on the obstacles. Bad news sells papers, after all.
Deals are in place (Pang Da, Youngman, etc) that make the medium-long term future for Saab very promising after this short-term liquidity crisis is behind us. If people can actually make their way through the analysis and speculation to find news about the actual products that we sell, they’ll see that our vehicles are world class. That’s the message that we now need to communicate all over again.
We have a lot of repair work to do in order to restore public confidence. Some in the press have staked their professional reputations on our demise so I don’t expect too much in the way of changed tone from them. But the motoring press know what we’ve got in our product portfolio. They know that it’s very, very good and getting better. They know that Saab is a company that’s worth keeping in the automotive sphere. We have to get that knowledge out and into the wider community, and that’s going to be the challenge for Saab in the coming months and years.
We’ve had a lot of people ask us questions in the public domain in the last few weeks. I hope we’ve been able to manage those questions to your satisfaction within the limitations we face as a public company. I also hope we can bring you some more engagement with our executive team as the time pressures on them ease up a bit.
We’ve also received a LOT of support from people in our social spaces and I want to extend a heartfelt thanks on behalf of the company to all of you for that. Our enthusiast community is one of the most engaged in all autodom and they prove this support time after time, after time. Griffin up, people!
We still have work to do and we will keep on fighting. We never, ever give up. And most importantly, we keep working on designing and building the best, safest and most fun vehicles we possibly can for our customers.
