Re: GM and SAAB (was: Ford and BMW)

[John Firestone <john.firestone@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

David Holeman wrote:

> I think about a crappy car company like Ford buying BMW and I shudder.
> Just look at what they did to SAAB.  One of the finest turbo engines on
> the market and they move to make the 900 look like a Taurus and they put
> ford engines in them.

GM, not Ford, bought half of SAAB (49/50/51% - I forget) and in a
misguided attempt to cut costs forced a lot of unfamiliar Opel parts
on them. GM has since learned and is giving Saab much more
independance.  Saab has the full use of GM's purchasing network and
their test facilities, and they still adapt/adopt parts from Opel -
but from what I can tell, on their terms, not GM's. Now if only GM
could come to a similar understanding about Opel.

- -John
'96 318is

- -- 
john.firestone@domain.elided

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