Tooling for the old Saab 9-5 has been sold to Chinese car maker BAIC
It’s been confirmed that Chinese car maker BAIC has bought Saab’s tooling and tech for the old 905 and 9-3.
That’s the old Saab 9-5, not the latest 2010 Saab 9-5, just in case you thought GM had gone slightly mad.
We reported back at the beginning of October that Saab’s owners GM had done a deal with Chinese car maker BAIC to sell the rights and tooling for the old Saab 9-5 and 9-3. Iit’s taken Saab a couple of months to catch up with our story, but they’ve now confirmed that the deal is done and that BAIC are taking the old 9-5 and 9-3 off to be produced in China.
All of which is a slightly odd twist in the saga that is the sale of Saab. When the Koenigsegg deal to buy Saab fell out of bed last month, it was reported that one of the main obstacles was GM’s desire to keep their technology out of Chinese hands (BAIC was a partner in the Koenigsegg bid). Of course, this is not new GM tech but old, but its still puts a question mark over the real reason the Koenigsegg deal failed.
Despite the sales of Saab’s old model tech to BAIC Spyker still appears to be in the frame to take over Saab’s current tech. But GM have stated that if the deal is not confirmed by the end of December then they will wind up Saab.
Which would be a sad end.
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