GM may start building Saab cars for the American market in the United States to ease the effect of exchange rate movements, GM Chief Executive Rick Wagoner told German business newspaper Handelsblatt. The company’s Swedish carmaking unit currently makes big losses and is subject to a cost-cutting plan (Viggen).
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“Saab is a small manufacturer which is very dependent on the US market. It has a lot of revenues in dollars, but no costs in the currency,” Wagoner told the Handelsblatt.
He also said Sweden’s Saab needed to sell more models in the United States, the world’s biggest car market.
“That could mean building additional models over there (in the US) that are specifically for the American market,” he said.
Saab’s profitability has been hurt at times in the past by the strength of the Swedish crown against the dollar. Swedish voters have also just voted to reject membership of the EU’s single currency, the euro.
Saab’s sales in 2002 were around 120,000 units and the financial losses of the unit – around $500 million – severely impaired GM Europe’s performance.
