General Motors is expecting that talks with potential investors in its European Opel/Vauxhall unit will continue into May.
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“Discussions are continuing with a number of interested parties as we speak,” CEO Fritz Henderson told a press conference in Detroit on Monday. He declined to name the interested parties.
In answer to reporters’ questions, he said he could not foresee separate GM separated into domestic and foreign entities.
“It’s not on my radar screen,” Henderson said. “I think General Motors will remain a global corporation without a doubt but there’s no question in my mind the nature of those global relationships will change.”
IF GM’s share of the European unit was, for example, to dip below 50%, “we would need to manage our European business much like our business in Korea. I think it could be done successfully.”
He said that further talks were ongoing over the future of Delphi and was hopeful progress would be made in May when a key credit facility falls due.
Deeper white collar job cuts will also be made.
“We’re going to go deeper on both executive and salaried manpower to create a simpler, leaner organisation,” Henderson said.
Dealers affected by the cutback in the retail network will be notified in May and told of the offers available to them. Henderson said he was confident the task could be completed by 2010 as planned.
Henderson said discussions over the sale of the Saturn, Hummer and Saab brands were continuing. GM still expected to stop building Saturn models this year.
