GM sells Saab to Spyker

General Motors, the US based automaker, has inked a last minute deal to save its Saab brand by selling it to Dutch firm Spyker. Without disclosing the financial details of the deal, GM said in a statement that it has sold its money losing Swedish brand Saab to Spyker.

Though GM refused to give the financial details of the transaction, it has been reported that the deal value is somewhere between USD 400million and USD 500million.

Out of the reported USD 400-500million, USD 74million would be in cash, while the remaining amount will be paid as deferred shares.

The Swedish carmaker Saab has a distinctive audience in European racing/sports loving countries. But as the company’s owner GM went through financial difficulties, it failed to find audiences around the world leading to losses for Saab. Though the brand is a loss making one, experts believe the company could return to profits with the right owner.

Also, even though Saab was reporting losses for quite some time, GM had been wary of selling the brand, since it feared selling it to a rival would give the company a technical edge over GM.

People are comparing the deal to a David-Goliath one, because of the size of the two companies involved in the deal. While Saab has almost 3400 staff, Spyker has only 100.