I am also confident that this plan will not be approved by the Feds unless it allows most of Chrysler’s existing factories to remain open.
And, as to the actual Fiats that would be sold alongside the new cars manufactured in Chrysler plants, I think that it is important to keep an open mind regarding Fiat quality. Sure, Fiats were poor quality when they were last sold in the US, but things could have changed drastically over the ensuing decades.
US-designed cars today are more durable, more reliable, more economical, and more road-worthy than they were in the '70s, so to automatically assume that the new Fiats are as bad as the old ones is…IMHO…short-sighted. Would Fiat really be as competive as it currently is in Europe if their products were still as bad as they were many years ago?
Personally, I would prefer a Fiat 500 to a Smart car.
Fiat quality has improved dramatically since the last time they were sold in the US. That still does not make them competitive with Toyota or Honda, but Fiat small cars with US rust protedtion will be better than the Neon and its sucessors. The enginering is also more spophistcated and space utilzation is superb.
It just might work; the current president of Fiat was brought up in North America and has a good feel for what will sell, much like Carlos Ghones?, the president of Renault/Nissan.
In any case I doubt if anyone can mismanage Chrysler the way Mercedes did; totally hamhanded and insensitve to local needs.
Germans are insensitive? I am shocked! Shocked, I say!
Please note that I can say this without being politically incorrect, simply because I am 1/2 German (actually, 1/2 Prussian, which is essentially Uber-German).
“Why would Daimler refuse to relinquish their worthless 19.9% stake in Chrysler if it truly is worthless?”
Well, if you show something on your books at several billion dollars, you might be reluctant to admit it was worth less.
It was reported that Fiat had no interest unless there was six or eight billion taxpayer dollars infused into Chrysler.
Back in the 90’s Chrysler built a new factory. The city of Detroit paid Chrysler $200,000 per job to locate in Motown. Wonder how that worked out for them?
East Prussia has, at various times, been under a “German” flag and at other times, under a Polish flag. (What was East Prussia has been part of Poland since the end of WW II) That’s why some of my ancestors spoke both languages, I suppose.
However, ff you are talking about Prussia “proper”, which is the area surrounding Berlin, that has never been Polish territory.
“Well, if you show something on your books at several billion dollars, you might be reluctant to admit it was worth less.”
Now is the time to write every loss off. Investors expect the worst, so it won’t have a terrible effect on the stock price. Keeping it signals that they anticipate Chrysler may be worth more as a result of an alliance with Fiat.
“It was reported that Fiat had no interest unless there was six or eight billion taxpayer dollars infused into Chrysler.”
All kinds of stuff is reported all the time. Is it real? Who said that? If you can attribute the information to an authorized representative of Fiat, it carries weight. Otherwise, it is gossip.
The president of Fiat was in Detroit this week to discuss a few things with Chrysler management. Why would he make the trip if it was all just a sham? That does not mean that the deal will go through, but it is an excellent indication that there is serious interest.
Now that the merger has supposedly taken place, it makes you wonder “what ARE they doing now?” They offered virtually nothing at the Detroit auto show–not even a concept car was unveiled which doesn’t look good for them at all. They need to be looking at what the competition is offering or is going to offer. They know that the Prius has sold well due to the great gas mileage (minus the problems Toyota is now experiencing with the pedal problems) and they also know that Ford will be bringing the Fiesta to the U.S. either late this year or early next year. GM has a couple gas efficient models for next year as well as the Volt electric (which remains to be seen as the magic pill for gas mileage). But how intelligent does a company need to be? In my opinion, the engineers should have been working their tails off to bring new and innovative designs to the public. But they sat on their hands for too many years. And one of their better selling mid-sized cars (Cirrus) was scrapped a long time ago for the gas-guzzling clunker called Sebring which has had some poor ratings in Consumer Reports. They just need to get off their duffs and actually work to re-gain their footing. Otherwise, they are just putting off the eventual death of a car company that has offered too little too late.