Fiat Wants Opel

Bertel Schmitt
by Bertel Schmitt

Fiat wants to get its hands on Opel, and the Opel workers don’t like it at all. Opel workers council chief Klaus Franz confirmed today that Fiat is in intensive negotiations to take over Opel. A memorandum of understanding may be signed as early as this coming Tuesday, reports Automobilwoche [sub]. Franz is very much against it:


According to Franz, Fiat doesn’t want to build a big car empire. All they want are the credit guarantees that are offered by the German government as a dowry if Opel finds a suitable partner “Fiat has a debt load of €14.2 billion and really bad liquidity problems. There is no other way fort them to raise funds,” Franz said.

A spokesperson of GM Europe didn’t want to comment the comments of their über-shop steward. The spokesperson gave the tired party line of GM being in contact with a number of interested, but unnamed investors.

Franz is worried that Fiat will “show their true colors” after the fall elections and will initiate massive job cuts. Between Opel and Fiat “is brutal overlap in all segments” said Franz, who also serves as Vice Chairman of the Opel supervisory board—he should and must know.

Fiat did not comment. According to Klaus Koch, premier of Opel’s home state Hesse, “there is no decision yet—Magna and Fiat are only some of the parties interested in Opel.” Politicians. Can’t keep their mouths shut.

In related news, all signs are on red in Milan. In Q1 09, Fiat’s sales dropped from €15 billion last year to €11 billion this year. After reporting a net gain of €405 million in Q1 08, the first quarter of 09 has a loss of €410 million on Fiat’s books.

Bertel Schmitt
Bertel Schmitt

Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.

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  • RetardedSparks RetardedSparks on Apr 23, 2009

    The new company would be called "Fiat/Opel/Chrysler United" Abbreviated to "FOC U" The grill badge could be a middle finger....

  • Bunter1 Bunter1 on Apr 23, 2009

    Lumberg-I'm willing to sign on as head of Design and Engineering (for a reasonable integer multiple of my current salary and stock options, AU chute etc., position on BOD) ;^D Ditto on debt burden etc. Write something up and pitch it to Barry O., an "American effort to save CryCo!" OK-who's got PR covered? Bunter

  • Juniper Juniper on Apr 23, 2009

    If Fiat still wants to come back to the US market, the best way is thru Chrysler. If they have the time and the money they can slowly evolve Chrysler dealers into Fiat dealers. OR go broke trying.

  • Anonymous Anonymous on Apr 23, 2009

    Hey Bunter, maybe my Brother-in-law could work for you in the reformulated Chrysler? He's currently an engineer with GM (Delphi, actually), and I fear that he's going to be looking for a job soon after 20+ years with the same company.

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