As the original Inside Saab will most likely go off-air soon, I’ve created this site as an historical archive of what happened with Inside Saab during it’s short, but momentous life.
Please note that this site is not open for comments. It’s just an historical record. There will be no further updates.
Links to Inside Saab article contained in stories on this site refer back to the original URL (inside.saab.com). Once inside.saab.com is off the air, those links will be broken. If you want to read those stories, however, you should be able to simply replace the ‘inside.saab.com’ bit with ‘inside-saab.com’ and it should work.
My thanks to all who supported Inside Saab over the short time it existed. My thanks also to Saab for having the courage to publish an insider blog. I only wish we had the chance to really do it properly.
Steven Wade
(former) Social Media Project Leader, Saab Automobile
Inside Saab.
It’s been a quiet few days here on the site, basically because there’s no communications coming my way, nothing to say, and permission needed before I relate that nothingness to you anyway. All communications are now the domain of the receivers appointed by the court to determine the future of Saab and its three bankrupt entities.
I heard a few days ago that my employment with Saab Australia will technically finish at the end of this month, which is totally understandable.
As such, my stint here at Inside Saab and with this wonderful company called Saab, comes to an end. It’s a sad, distressing time for everybody concerned, of course.
On a vocational level, working with an OEM automotive manufacturer and for Saab in particular has always been a dream for me. In April, that dream came true when I started at here at Saab. A few days after I started, that dream began unravelling, but that’s a story I don’t feel like re-living right here, right now.
On a personal level, I’ve made so many good friends over the years writing about Saab and it’s sad to have to say goodbye to such brilliant, classy people. It’s been nearly seven years since I first switched on the lights at Trollhattan Saab, my first Saab blog. Since then, I’ve corresponded with thousands of people and met many of them face to face at Saab events all over the world. I’ve made so many good friends amongst the excellent people who were associated with this brand.
As has been intimated in news reports, there is an opportunity under Swedish law for Saab to be sold as a whole, by the appointed receivers. I sincerely hope the right people with the right resources and the right attitude jump through this small window of opportunity. The extremely talented and dedicated people at Saab deserve it.
I’ll sign off for now. Those who are interested will probably find me on the web elsewhere. Writing about Saab and cars in general is as normal to me as breathing.
Thanks so much to everyone who has supported the work I’ve done over the last few years. I’ve been in touch with many of you personally already, and will continue to do so. Thanks so much to Saab for having the courage to do something like this on an official level. We never got the chance to do it for real thank to events of the last months, but we did do something good here, something that would have worked.
Apparently if I wait a few hours to write this, as I’d like to, then it would have to be approved first by whoever the court appoints as the bankruptcy administrator. Screw that.
Like many of you, I’m going through a whole range of dark emotions right now. There are several individuals and several companies that I’d like to have experience the sort of pain I’m sure all of my colleagues at Saab are experiencing at this moment. That’ll pass, though.
More than that, I’m just feeling a very simple and profound sadness.
Saab is a great company, full of great people, wonderful ideas and technology. We had some incredible things in the pipeline and it saddens me that those products may never be seen. We have the greatest fans and enthusiasts – I’d rank them second to no other automotive company in the world. I’d have loved to see people taking delivery of more 9-4x’s and the 9-5 SportCombi, not to mention the 9-3 replacement that we have under development.
I feel so bad for all of the wonderful people I’ve worked with. I’ve been writing about Saab for nearly seven years now and whilst I’ve poured plenty of heart and soul into this brand, I’m just a babe in the woods compared to most of my colleagues at Saab. There are hundreds, probably into the thousands, who have spent their entire careers designing and building these fantastic cars. Anyone who’s been to a Saab Festival in Sweden will know the kind of family atmosphere that exists around these events and that’s not because we’re simply a bunch of crazies who are into an oddball brand – it’s because the company IS as close to a big family as a large industrial concern can be. That spirit comes out in the people who work here and the people who own the cars.
I also feel bad for Trollhattan, a city I’ve come to appreciate and love since my first visit there in 2007. The one thing I’ve learned is that the city, more than anything else, is resilient. The Swedish approach to life makes it so. They prepare for tough times and whatever happens with Saab in the coming weeks, months and years, and despite the fact that the place may not be the same, I hope the people there bounce back and show their toughness.
I feel bad for Erik Carlsson, Stig Blomqvist, Per Eklund, Bjorn Envall and men and women of their era – all of the pioneers who created what we have today, and the guys at the Saab Museum who care for our heritage.
The easy thing to do right now is play the blame game. There are so many people/groups on my list right now it’s not funny. The saddest part about this whole tragedy is that it was all so very avoidable. What we’ve come to today, IMHO, is the culmination of a collection of short-sighted, ill-considered and opportunistic decisions. Some of them were made by Saab, some of them were made by people or companies outside of Saab. I truly believe that all of them were avoidable.
I can’t profess to know the full legal ramifications of today’s announcement. I heard a guy on Swedish Radio last week say that bankruptcy might not be the final ending for Saab and I would like to maintain some hope that there has been a company waiting in the wings for this to happen. I’d like to believe it, but I fear that today’s announcement and it’s consequences are as final as they appear.
For those asking ‘what happens next?’…… I’ll be seeking some guidance in that regard and will post what I can here on Inside Saab as information becomes available. As mentioned, future communications will all have to be approved by the administrator installed by the court. We will do what we can.
I think I can speak on behalf of my colleagues in thanking all of you for your support over the last months. It’s been a troubling time for everybody and I can’t help but think of the customers who have supported us and all of those who planned to do so in the near future.
For now, we all wait to learn what happens next and see where that takes us.
Later today, in Sweden, there will be a court hearing to determine whether Saab’s reorganisation should continue. To say there’s a lot hanging in the balance would be the understatement of the year.
Here’s the scenario, as seen from someone on the other side of the world and somewhat out of the loop*:
The outcome of that hearing will depend largely on the future plan that Saab has developed to carry the business forward. Details about that plan will no doubt be forthcoming at the time, but all indications are that it will hinge upon setting up the business in a compartmentalised way so as to separate current models built with GM’s intellectual property from future models developed in conjunction with our Chinese partners, Youngman.
The other (perhaps most) crucial element of today’s proceedings will be evidence of support shown by Youngman. The Jerry Maguire phrase “Show Me The Money” feels kind of appropriate here. November wages are already overdue and December wages are due only days from now. Swedish media reports in the last few hours indicate that there may be signs of nerves within Youngman, thanks primarily to statements made by our former parent.
Over the weekend, General Motors re-stated its intention to withhold support for any such deal. From our end, it is contended that GM’s support is not needed as the proposal will not change the ownership structure of Saab. Formal dealings with Youngman will be setup in another entity focused on new model development for the future. I don’t know if it’s the job of a judge in Vänersborg to sort that out, but I guess we’ll find out pretty soon.
I’m not normally one given to poking an angry bear in the ribs, but I’d like to reiterate something I wrote here on Inside Saab a while ago – Ford found a way to get a similar deal done for Volvo, and I’m sure they’re keen on protecting their interests in China, too. This deal can, and should, be done. No less a man than Keith Crain, the Editor-in-Chief of Automotive News agrees.
Is today D-Day? All indications point that way right now, but this story has had so many twists and turns that it would be a brave man who attached any level of conviction to his prediction.
This is such a great company. It must survive and I hope that common sense and goodwill prevails today, for the sake of everyone who has an interest in the outcome: Our employees, our suppliers, our dealers and distributors, and of course, our customers.
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* Again, I have to express my own personal frustration at not being able to bring readers more information about this process. The shackles are necessary, even if they are ultimately self-defeating and incredibly frustrating.
The Examiner is posing some Dear Santa questions from various stakeholders in the car industry:
Saab Owners: A glimmer of hope for the future of their beloved, quirky sport sedan.
Actually, I think most people are wishing for a future hatchback, but that aside….
Yes, people are indeed looking for hope for Saab Automobile. This weekend’s going to be a crucial one as we have a very important court hearing on Monday afternoon and some key events leading up to that hearing will go a long way in determining the short term future of the company.
The Examiner’s info is a little bit outdated (not uncommon) but there is plenty of hope for this company if we can overcome a few short term, not-insignificant obstacles.
Naturally, I keep a pretty close eye on what’s being reported in the motoring press about Saab’s current fight to survive. It will come as no surprise that many commentators wrote Saab off a long time ago.
all these delays have only made it more likely that Saab will die on the week before Christmas.
Those are probably the kindest words uttered about Saab by TTAC in the last six months.
The news services generally report events as they happen, with a little bit of historical context thrown in. They rarely make predictions about what will happen next, most likely because they’ve learned from prior experience that with Saab, especially in 2011, you can’t tell what’s going to happen next 🙂
Commentators, on the other hand, are paid to provide commentary. They interpret and they use their varied levels of experience to predict what they think is going to happen in the future. That’s reasonably easy when it comes to most companies, but not with Saab, and many commentators had Saab dead and buried well before December 2011.
They’re generally a proud bunch and don’t like to change their predictions – egos are just as prominent amongst commentators as they are amongst auto executives and a reputation for reading the wind correctly is everything – but it’s good to see that some writers are at least recognising the incredibly gutsy fight being put up by the Saab executive here in Sweden.
It’s proving a lot more risky than most folks might have anticipated to bet against the struggling Swedish automaker Saab.Just ask administrator Guy Lofalk.
Barely a week ago, he had recommended that the courts end Saab’s voluntary reorganization, which would have meant the collapse of the company, which has been struggling to find investors – or a buyer – since last spring. Instead, Lofalk has been fired and replaced with what appears to be a more willing administrator while Saab itself will have some more time to pull together a deal.
By the way, some reports (like this one at Reuters) might leave readers with the impression that Guy Lofalk won’t be allowed to resign his position as administrator. My understanding is that Lofalk has to stay on until Monday – the court hearing, again – which will give our creditors the opportunity to approve the change of administrator. So he will be able to leave the position, just not quite at the time of his choosing.
Every week for months now, I expect to be writing a small obituary for Saab, gone to join the likes of Pontiac, Saturn, Oldsmobile, Rover, Austin et al in brand name heaven and, every week, another rabbit gets pulled out of the hat.
That’s the quote that started this whole post, actually.
The reasons that people write us off are understandable given that they’re not privy to all that’s happening at Saab. We’re a small fish in a big ocean, we’re in financial trouble, etc etc. We have some key stakeholders that have made decisions about our future for us and we’ve had to work around those decisions, which has made the process even longer.
But the key thing to remember here is that we DO have a lot of things going for us as a company. Perhaps the key thing going for us right now is the significant interest we have some from some well-resourced investors and the support we have from our closest stakeholders.
They key question is whether or not a structure can be found and put into motion quickly enough to reassure the decision makers. It’s quite literally a race against time. A valid solution is in place and should be presented on Monday. It’s a matter of whether or not we’ll be allowed the time to execute it.
From a media-watcher’s point of view, it’s just good to see some recognising that we’re working our butts off to achieve a good result here. And that we’re not doing it without reason.
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Have a good weekend. No prizes for guessing what’s on our Christmas wish list this year – a speedy positive outcome for our employees and a bright future for the Saab brand.
I re-tweeted a message from Ben Pulman, the road-test editor of CAR Magazine, earlier today:
The picture he links to is one of UrSaab, from the 1997 50th Anniversary photoshoot.
I’ve written before about how, generally speaking, motoring media professionals want to see Saab survive and succeed. There is some hope pinned to this company; perhaps the notion that some sort of different thinking still exists in a world of car design that’s getting smaller and smaller every year.
Of course, even Saab vehicles have become a bit more homogenised in the last 10 or so years, which made Saab’s sale to Spyker Cars last year an even brighter beacon for the ‘different thinkers’ out there. Victor Muller came out and said that we were going to design and build Saab Saabs again and we all took great heart from that. From what I know of the Saab 9-3 replacement that’s currently under development, he’s been true to his word, too.
Personally speaking, I want Saab to survive because I love the company. I love the history, the philosophy and of course, I drive and love the vehicles. It was an honour for me to join this company earlier this year, the culmination of 6 years work as an independent. I love working for the little car company that could and despite what appear to be dire circumstances right now, I hold on to the hope that our work may continue into the future.
We don’t get as many comments on Inside Saab as other Saab sites. That’s OK. Given that Inside Saab is a corporate site for a listed company, we’ve been limited in what we can say this year, and thus limited in the amount of discussion that we can promote.
However, I’d like to invite you to share your thoughts on why you’d like to see Saab survive and continue into the future.
Our people are extremely loyal. The few that I know who have left Saab in recent months have done so with heavy hearts. I’m sure those who remain would enjoy reading your thoughts on this subject.
People are still working. People are still getting incredibly frustrated. I’m one of them.
As I mentioned in one of my previous posts here, there seem to be so many big personalities involved in this affair and the focus is well and truly on them and the various perspectives they embody. All of these players have an angle, have something they’re trying to protect and a good dose of spin they’re using to put it out there in the public domain. Some of it is genuine. In my humble (and very personal) opinion, some of it is camouflage.
For the rest of us …… Scrape away all the big-business and industrial politics and you’ve got the people, the entity, that I’m concerned about: Saab Automobile. It’s a company that’s full of people who already have, and who under the right circumstances can continue to make a wonderful contribution to the automotive landscape.
I only started at Saab back in April of this year but I’ve met so many people who are working on great projects at Saab. Projects that will make a real difference to the cars people might be able to drive in the future. The vast majority of these people have remained committed to Saab, even in the most dire circumstances.
From the people I know at Saab, they want to be there not because it’s a job, but because they love working for a place that’s innovative and challenging. They love the company’s identity, the opportunities that such a small yet diverse company offers – being involved in the whole vehicle design process from start to finish on one small campus. It’s an environment that few other car companies on earth can offer.
Make no mistake – this company is viable. All of the required elements are there.
What it will take is some investment and some goodwill on the part of the people in the decision-making seats. I wish I could rely on a quote that I learned from a prominent former football coach here in Australia – the ox is slow but the earth is patient.
Unfortunately, I can’t. The clock is ticking.
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And whilst we all wait for those people, here’s 7 minutes of Arnold Schwarzenegger fighting and screaming, which is pretty much how many of us feel right now.
A lot of people are writing to me, asking if we’re going to hear something soon about the sale (or otherwise) of Saab Automobile.
Let me answer all of you at once: I’m waiting just like the rest of you.
Sorry, but I’ve got no magic answers or insights for you. This is a corporate page and we can’t give a running commentary on these constantly changing events. We can’t say anything about what’s going to happen, until it happens. As I’m sure you’ve come to understand by now, this whole process is extremely delicate and complex. It’s the business equivalent of every amusement park ride you’ve ever had, all rolled into one.
There’s a hell of a lot at stake – a car company with thousands of people connected to it, a wonderful past, a promising future, as well as the economic stability of a region and in many respects, a more-than-reasonable portion of Swedish industry. The knock-on effects of this falling one way or the other will have serious consequences for all concerned.
If you’re keeping yourselves well read from a variety of sources then you might sense that reports about this affair are becoming more and more about people and personalities. For me, it would be really unfortunate if that’s what this came down to.
This is about business and keeping a great company alive.
I’m going to sound like a broken record here, but it really does come down to the fact that Saab is a great company, with great products right now, even greater products in the pipeline, a very efficient and flexible factory, a supremely intelligent and committed workforce and a valuable heritage.
The notion that a deal should be struck to save Saab Automobile comes down to one thing and one thing only – That we have something valuable to offer to the right owners and partners.
Which we do.
Thanks once again for your support. I know you’re tired. We’re tired, too, but we keep on working and fighting. I hope the suits can continue to negotiate in good faith and that we can all have a successful outcome to celebrate, sooner rather than later.
We’ve all been hanging on the ‘what?’ for so long. We’re all fatigued due to the lack of visible, tangible progress in the potential sale of Saab Automobile.
I’d like to take a moment and think again about the ‘why?’
Why should the sale of Saab be allowed to proceed? Why doesn’t the company, like so many analysts out there, acknowledge that the light at the end of the tunnel is actually a train coming at 200mph? Why do we want to live, rather than pack our collective bags and move on?
Because we have a valid place in this industry, that’s why. Because we care about what we do and the way we do it, and we believe that enough people care about the same philosophy to ensure us a future in the marketplace. Because we believe 200% that we can make this work.
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We have a great range of cars that are just one decision away from being produced. Not planned, but produced.
They’re the best cars we’ve ever built. They have better emissions than other full size, full power competitors. They have better design characteristics. They have fantastic build quality and the best thing about our vehicle range is that it’s only getting better.
The Saab 9-3 Griffin is the best 9-3 we’ve ever made – inside, outside and under the hood. It has a new full-power, full size diesel variant that will attract tax benefits in certain key markets due to it’s outstanding emissions figures. All that, with no sacrifice in cargo space or performance. No compromises.
The Saab 9-5 SportCombi is ready to complement the 9-5 Sedan as our flagship vehicle and the combi body is a welcome addition, especially in key European markets.
The Saab 9-4x is just plain outstanding. It’s been getting great reviews and we would love to be able to push this vehicle to its limits.
We have incredible people. I arrived into a baptism of fire when I started with Saab in April this year. Day three of my employment coincided with a factory stoppage that essentially continues to this day. All this time, Saab people have continued to plan where they can, to develop product where they can. We’ve learned to do things under pressure, without budgets, without contractor support. We’ve done all of this because it’s been necessary to do it. We’ve done this because we want Saab to succeed.
The Saab dealer tours in Germany, Austria and France have reinforced to me what wonderful people we have at Saab. I’ve been so touched by the emails I’ve received from people, customers expressing their gratitude for these tours, expressing their admiration for the new vehicles and dealers expressing the joy that they had in representing the Saab brand to their customers again.
I’ve had other emails, too, from dealers concerned about their futures. I’m concerned for them, too, and I know that our executive team are concerned about them because they’re the backbone of our distribution network. Many of them have been associated with Saab for decades. They’re family, and we’re all doing it tough together.
One word that you could use to describe Saab people (aside from intelligent, talented and a bunch of others) is resilient. We believe in what we do and that belief gives us some strength to keep on working. Our company took on safety before the marketing mavens made it popular, before the lawmakers made it mandatory. Our company took on turbocharging when fuel was less than a fifth of the price that it is today.
We do some things because we have to. We do many things because it’s the right way, the Saab way.
Saab is still a wonderful brand with a fantastic history and a global presence. We have been kicked around, but never broken. We still have a lot of people in our corner. We enjoy great support from both the enthusiast community and the motoring fraternity. People want to see us succeed.
Saab still has a brilliant engineering crew, innovative design staff and flexible manufacturing capacity.
Saab has fantastic plans in place for future vehicles and progressive technical partners on our side to make those plans a reality.
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Right now our executive team are negotiating with our stakeholders and potential new owners to try and get an outcome that will satisfy everyone.
I sincerely hope that everything that can be done, is being done by all concerned. Saab will be a long-term commitment for whoever takes us on in the future, but we’ve got the tools and the plans in place to hold and build our place in this industry.
It’s easy to say we’re small, therefore we can’t make it. We believe that we can. With the right backing and the right partnerships in place, we can finish remodelling our business, build great Saab cars that find their market and build on that market for the future. We’ve already done a lot of work on those partnerships, all we need is the backing and the cooperation of those concerned to get things moving again.
There’s so much riding on this. The careers of so many good, talented people. The cars that are ready to go to market right now, and the cars that will come in the future.
As I’ve written many times before, I cannot imagine that a company with so much going for it could be left to die. It just doesn’t make any sense. We want to get this moving, and I sincerely hope that we can.
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For those who haven’t seen them, I’d encourage you to read the full series of In Saab’s Corner articles, prepared back in September.
A story from earlier in the week prompted a few Saab purchase stories from the pre-internet days. Forgetting the internet for a moment, it’s always interesting to hear how people first get into Saabs.
I received one such story via email but I haven’t sought permission to share it here as yet. I’ll do that shortly. In the meantime, I thought I’d reminisce a little……
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The archives of my first Saab website, Trollhattan Saab, are out of action at the moment. If they were operating, you’d be able to read about my first Saab experience in a mid-1980’s Saab 9000 at 200kph. I’ll re-write it one day.
That experience, in the very early 1990s, got me thinking about Saab. I was in no position to buy one, but rather than lampooning them as I did with many European cars during my misguided youth, I started to look for them.
I finished my university studies at the end of 1997 and got married (first time) the year after. Let’s just say that my first wife was not exactly a car person and it took a reasonable amount of arm twisting and good behaviour before we had a consensus that it would be reasonable to start looking for a ‘fun car’ for me. She had a Toyota Corolla at the time and I had a rotating garage door that saw several different Fords and Holdens from my employer of the day – hardly inspiring stuff.
This was the late 1990s and there were quite a few Saabs advertised back then. Tasmania actually had one of the best per-capita Saab dealerships in Australia during the 1980s and early 1990s, so the local stocks were pretty good. I can remember testing a magnificent blue Saab 900 Turbo, with a blue velour interior. It was a very early model, perhaps 1980 or 1981 and I was stunned by how much fun it was to drive (it had been around six years since my first experience in the 9000 – a long time between drinks).
I also tested a Saab 9000 Turbo in Rose Quartz metallic, with a dark red interior. It was like being in a mobile gentlemans club. I loved it, but it was well out of my very shallow price range.
That consensus opinion led to me having an allocation of only a few thousand dollars, but I wasn’t discouraged. I ended up perusing the newspapers on Saturday mornings, when the local rags had their classified listings. One particular Saturday, a dismantler had an ad for a Saab 99 in the paper – a complete running car that he wanted to sell rather than break up.
The car turned out to be a red Saab 99E from around 1972. It had the blue badge on the silver grille and given that it was being sold by what we call a “wrecker” here in Australia, you can imagine that it wasn’t presented in pristine condition. In fact, it was filthy.
The dismantler did some mechanical work on the side and the owner of the car was an elderly lady who was a client of his. He’d worked on the car for a few years and assured us that it was in sound condition. Time for a test drive, then….
A little bit more context is needed at this point. Please remember that I’m talking about Tasmania in the late 1990s. The closest thing to a computer in my possession at that time was a first generation Playstation. I had no point of reference for an early Saab and scant knowledge of the company’s history. To me, based on the Saab 900 and 9000 Turbos I’d driven, all Saab were wonderfully well equipped and quite fast.
As it turned out, a 1972 Saab 99E with a single-carb, 1.85L engine and an automatic transmission is nothing like a turbocharged Saab 900 or 9000. The car was as slow as a wet week and I refer you to my earlier comments about its presentation. There wasn’t a lot to get excited about, to be honest.
BUT….. it had oodles of character and despite the problems getting it started, it did get down the road OK (eventually). I wasn’t getting the Saab experience that I’d counted on, but I was definitely getting a Saab experience. And after so many months of wanting a car to play around with, a car with character, I decided to negotiate a price and we eventually took the car home.
My first wife and I didn’t get along that well in the end, but the demise of our marriage had nothing to do with sub-standard cleaning skills. We got the little 99E home and proceeded to pull apart the interior and she worked absolute wonders in stripping the insides and cleaning up every little nook and cranny. I felt a little bit ashamed at how much more thorough she was, compared to what I would have been. I took care of the exterior and I have to say, the car shone like some sort of miniature Swedish fire engine by the time we were done with it. The transformation was absolutely amazing.
As mentioned earlier, this was right at the beginning of my professional career, post university, and well before the digital age that we enjoy now. Thus, there are no wonderful digital images for me to post here. Somewhere there are a couple of blurry images from my old 35mm camera, but I couldn’t find them for this piece.
It looked quite a bit like the one to the right, except it was the first year of the black-bumper models and had square headlamps instead of the round ones shown here. The car had a red velour interior and the headrests shown in that image (the funkiest headrests EVER!). There was no center console under the dashboard, which was great for spreading your feet out over longer distances.
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We had a pretty good, albeit short time with the little red 99. My now ex-wife took it to work one night and on the way home, she did some damage that seemed uneconomical to repair (this was not the reason for the separation and divorce, I might add).
In hindsight, I think we could have fixed it, but it would have meant pouring quite a bit of money that we didn’t have into a car that we didn’t really appreciate the true value of. If only I’d known then what I know now.
The demise of the Saab 99E saw my buy an Alfasud Sprint – another short-lived ownership story thanks to a terrible cooling system – and then my turbo journey began with my first Saab 99 Turbo.
But that’s a story for another time……
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If you’ve got a first-Saab purchase story to tell, please do get in touch. It’d be great to share a few more of these.
And pictures would be wonderful if you’ve got them 🙂
