Swedes to repatriate Saab from GM

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By William Ehart

Sweden wants Saab back.

General Motors Corp. agreed Tuesday to sell the luxury carmaker to a consortium led by Koenigsegg Group AB, a Swedish company that sells only about a dozen custom sports cars a year.

For GM, it would be yet another sale of a unique brand that lost its cachet in the auto giant's mass-production culture. The deal would return Saab to Swedish control for the first time in nearly 20 years.

"Saab is a brand that is sort of iconic with a small core of consumers," said Jeremy Anwyl, chief executive officer of the car-shopping site Edmunds.com. "GM, for good or for ill, has not demonstrated expertise in nurturing these niche brands."

GM agreed to sell its Hummer and Saturn brands to different buyers earlier this month.

GM bought half of Saab for $600 million in 1990. It purchased the rest 10 years later for $125 million.

Saab dealers were pleased by news of a sale.

"We're happy," said Jenny Trostel of Anderson of Hunt Valley, a Baltimore-area dealer of GMC, Buick, Hummer and Saab.

"Having a new owner will help us with new product and hopefully will get us back with the part of the market where we need to be" - competing with Lexus, Toyota and Volvo, she said.

The preliminary deal, expected to close in the third quarter, includes $600 million in financing from the European Investment Bank, which is backed by the Swedish government. Other financial details were not disclosed. GM and the Koenigsegg consortium would provide additional funding, GM said.