Saab’s suppliers association head is confident the manufacturer will resolve problems that have affected payments for parts, leading to production halts, and has called on politicians to quickly approve any requested changes in ownership structure at the automaker.
“Of course it is a problem that our members have stopped supplying,” FKG managing director Sven-Ake Berglie told just-auto.
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“The reason is they are not getting paid. That has been the truth all the time.
“Saab is working extra hard to solve the situation, I believe they will succeed.”
Berglie noted that Saab was trying to rejig its ownership structure. Russian businessman Vladimir Antonov – a former Spyker shareholder who GM has prevented from taking a stake in Saab – put in a request to Sweden’s National Debt Office at the end of March to invest in the carmaker.
“As a supplier organisation, we can’t really see why the political institiutions should not approve that.”
Saab said on Wednesday it was suspending production until further notice pending resolution of the conflict with suppliers over unpaid bills that has rendered supply unstable.
“There is a production stop. We have decided that we don’t want to have these stop-and-gos any more. It’s not good for the whole production process,” Saab spokesman Eric Geers told AFP.
“We will resume production when we have come to an agreement that we expect soon,” he added.
Geers would not say how many suppliers had halted deliveries to Saab, but said the rate of deliveries was too unstable to ensure permanent production at the plant, with the company not having much stock of its own.
The current production stop marks the first time since Saab was rescued at the last minute by Dutch company Spyker cars in January 2010 that it was forced to halt production without a set date for starting it up again.
Last week, the company had already halted production three times as some suppliers halted deliveries over unpaid bills.
