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Surprise: UAW would be against merger
Filed under: Hirings/Firings/Layoffs, Chrysler, LLC., UAW/Unions  In an announcement that should be anything but shocking to anyone who even remotely follows the auto industry, United Auto Workers head Ron Gettelfinger says he and the UAW would be against any merger between automakers that would reduce either company's workforce. Considering that the Union's main job as of late has been safeguarding the jobs of its members, we would expect nothing less than an all-out war between Gettelfinger and the automakers involved, if such a merger were to take place, as much of the potential money savings would undoubtedly be in duplicate workforce reductions. In any case, Gettelfinger says that the UAW has not officially been contacted by either party regarding anything of the sort, lending further credence to the notion that any talks that are currently taking place are very much in the early stages.
[Source: The Detroit Free Press]Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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In addition to Nissan/Renault, Chrysler has been talking with Tata, Fiat
Filed under: Government/Legal, Hirings/Firings/Layoffs, Chrysler, LLC., GM, Nissan, Renault, FIAT, Tata, Rumormill  Bob Nardelli, Chrysler's current CEO, has given his employees the closest thing to an admission as we are likely to see that the company has been in serious negotiations with other automakers regarding future product plans and possibly even mergers. As has been widely reported over the weekend, Chrysler has apparently had discussions with General Motors regarding a tie-up between the two automakers, and the rumormill is churning away with stories that GM isn't the only suitor. Carlos Ghosn already has a history of merging automakers, and his Nissan/Renault partnership has naturally been recalled as a possible mate with Chrysler, as have Fiat and Tata Motors.
Remember that there's nothing concrete here to report, just speculation. At this point, all we know is that Nardelli admits that there are "third parties who are interested in exploring future possibilities with Chrysler" and that "as the company evaluates strategic options to maximize core operations and leverage its assets, we engage in a dialogue with these parties." Sounds pretty vague, wouldn't you say? These talks can be routine or they could be much more. We'll just have to keep an interested eye on the news.
[Source: The Detroit News]Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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Chrysler looking for partners for mid-size car
Filed under: Sedans/Saloons, Chrysler, LLC., Dodge 
Chrysler's Project D is in full swing, and the automaker has targeted an end-of-winter date for its decision on how to proceed. As a refresher, Chrysler has set up a team consisting of people from every facet of vehicle design and marketing with the goal of coming up with a suitable replacement for the Pentastar's mid-sized Sebring and Dodge Avenger, which we'll charitably describe as non-competitive. Possibilities for their replacements include creating a completely new vehicle architecture in-house or partnering up with another automaker that already has a well-designed sedan that Chrysler could use as a base for its next mid-sizer. Chrysler's not saying, but we've heard that discussions have taken place with Nissan/Renault, Fiat and, lest we forget, possibly even General Motors. According to the most recent reports, the automaker would actually prefer to partner-up on the project. In the mean time, we'd hope that Chrysler can perform a bit of mid-cycle magic on its Sebring and Avenger to make them just a wee bit more palatable.
[Source: Automotive News - sub. req'd]Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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NYT at it again: GM originally talked with Ford about merger
Filed under: Chrysler, LLC., Ford, GM, Rumormill 
Bill Vlasic, the man who was kind enough to drop the GM/Chrysler pseudo-bombshell on us late Friday night, posted a follow-up to his remarkably unremarkable story claiming that General Motors originally had talks with Ford about a possible merger before approaching the Pentastar people.
Again, the New York Times' scribe cites two unnamed sources about the merger discussions, reporting that GM approached Ford with the proposal, only to have FoMoCo execs shoot down the idea after several meetings. The talks included GM CEO Rick Wagoner, president Frederick Henderson, Ford's executive chairman Bill Ford Jr. and chief exec Alan Mulally.
According to the NYT's shy sources, the Blue Oval boys broke off talks in September when Ford and Mulally came to the conclusion that Ford would be better off reorganizing on its own rather than being tied to another automaker.
The Detroit News got in on the action yesterday, citing another anonymous source that said, "There were never in-depth, substantive discussions that went on. It was more an expression of interest [on GM's part], as in, 'Do you want to talk?'" Ford declined.
While all these reports are great at selling dead trees (and generating page-views), it deserves noting that high-level discussions between automakers are nothing new and hardly uncommon. Recent discussions - particularly those in the cited time-frame of three or four months, when federal loans to Detroit's Big Three were on everyone's lips - are surely newsworthy, let's not forget that parts sharing, from transmissions to hybrid drivetrains, have been happening routinely over the last few years. All this leads us to believe that business between Motown's finest will continue unchanged (for better and worse) and that unbelievable headlines are exactly that.
[Sources: NYT, Detroit News]Permalink | Email this | Comments
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GM/Cerberus talks over full ownership of GMAC
Filed under: Chrysler, LLC., GM, Earnings/Financials  It's been a crazy few days as news broke that Chrysler and General Motors have been in talks to combine operations. It turns out that there's a pretty significant back-story to these proceedings, and it involves Cerberus Capital Management's possible desire to shed its car-building operations and acquire the rest of GMAC, of which it already holds a controlling stake of 51%, with GM holding holding the other 49%. According to reports, Cerberus would like to combine Chrysler Financial with GMAC, which would allow it to merge the offices of the two financial institutions and reduce costs. All right, that might make some sense, but what about merging the two automakers? That's the part that seems so confusing to analysts and us meager bloggers. Somehow, we feel certain that there's more to this story, which we'll be hearing about for some time.
[Source: The Detroit News]Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments
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