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Just over a week ago, I did a phone interview with SBS Radio, a multi-language media organisation in my home country, Australia.
You should be able to listen to it on the embedded player, below.
If it doesn’t show there (it may drop off the playlist in the coming days) the you can go to the SBS Radio website. The interview should be here.
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My thanks to Johan Gabrielsson from SBS for the opportunity to talk about Saab and the role of that social media is playing within the company.
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Following on from our loose theme-o-the-month(s) on the 25th Anniversary of the Saab Convertible, I received these photos a few weeks ago from a technician at Just Saab in Dayton, Ohio.
The photo was taken towards the end of summer, 2010, oustide the service department of their dealership. That particular day, they had at least one example of each model 900 and 9-3 Convertible in for service.
I guess the only dilemma for the service staff would have been which one to jump into first!
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Thanks to Joey at Just Saab in Dayton for the pics!
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An internal communique from Saab updating the situation with regards to recent disruptions at the plant since resumption of production.
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The halt in production in April and May did not just affect Saab, but also our suppliers. We expected the risk of disruptions while restarting production, and have indeed experienced such disruptions this week. Therefore, the company decided yesterday to temporarily suspend production until we can secure a more stable flow of material.
Yesterday, Management reviewed the forecasted conditions for next week. This is part of the routine enabling us to inform suppliers about the production plan. The review revealed that suspended production will be necessary during next week as well.
The dialogue with our suppliers continues with high priority. Meanwhile, representatives from Saab and Spyker are working on a variety of initiatives to further strengthen our financial position in the short and long term and to stabilize operations. We expect to be able to make an announcement soon.
The Production staff will be at home today, Friday. Thereafter, Production management will make continual operating decisions about required attendance at work. The staff will be kept informed by their supervisors.
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End of the internal communique. Time for a little bit of context……
We have two primary ways of getting cashflow into our business.
The first is via commercial financial arrangements, which we continue to work hard at in order to secure our financial base for the future.
The second is to produce, sell and invoice cars, which is what we are working to secure with our suppliers. We now have an order bank of some 10,000 vehicles between our plant in Trollhattan and our 9-4x manufacturing arrangements with GM at Ramos Arizpe. This order bank represents a substantial and prolonged cash inflow.
As was mentioned when production resumed, we expected that there would be disruptions along the way. There are hundreds of suppliers involved with the production side of our business, and hundreds more involved in other aspects of the business. Our recent prolonged stoppage affected them in numerous ways, and this has had consequences for the re-start of production here at Saab.
As we’ve mentioned in prior communications, we are working hard on both sides of this cashflow issue and will continue to do so until the situation is resolved.
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Back in January 2010 there were a lot of gatherings around the world held in support of Saab as the company was threatened with closure by General Motors. The website that I used to run, Saabs United, was a central gathering point for the exchange of information about those convoys and it was a tremendous success.
I remember sitting at home watching the news flood my inbox as each of the convoys was held. You could almost track the movement of the sun by the email titles. I wasn’t surprised to see a huge gathering in Trollhattan, nor representation in Germany, France, the US and England. These were all markets I knew about.
What did surprise me, however, was the passion exhibited from Saab fans in Asia. The number of people and the incredible quality and condition of the vehicles they owned. I’ve talked to a few Saab tuning companies in my time and more than one has told me that their best and most fanatical customers are in Asia.
So it’s no surprise, then, that the following photo gallery from Hong Kong includes some fantastic Saabs. The event was held last weekend and I received the following review from Kenson Chan, part of the authorised dealer group in Hong Kong.
On June 5 (Sunday), the Saab Club HK gathered around 30 Saabs at a scenic place called Whitehead Club. Whitehead Club is just next to Sai Kung — the “Leisure Garden of Hong Kong” and has long been one of the most beautiful places in Hong Kong.
On that day, we were invited to join the gathering and we brought a new Saab 9-5 Aero and a 9-5 Vector to the venue. All members were happy to see the new Saab 9-5 and we also arranged test-drive session for them.
During the gathering, members showed their 900 Convertible and 9-3 Viggen to the media. Some members even tuned their cars on the day! At the end of the gathering, all members were given Saab Expression souvenir.
Sounds like a great club gathering and from the pictures, I think you’ll agree that Sai Kung is one of the most beautiful places in Hong Kong. What a setting!
My thanks to Kenson for the images and information, and congratulations to the Saab Club of Hong Kong on what looks like a wonderful outing.
Click the images to enlarge.
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File this under “Things that blow your mind about how incredibly complex it is to design and build a motor vehicle”. Long title, I know. But this is one of the more mind-blowing insights I’ve had into the vehicle development process since being here at Saab.
I’ve told people for some time now that there are no ‘fingersnap’ solutions when it comes to building/changing automobiles. It’s an incredibly complex process and whilst the evolution of electronics has given us many advances in vehicle functionality, behaviour and performance, the development work required to produce these advances is astounding. Add in the fact that everything you’re about to read has to be developed, tested and approved for all of Saab’s global markets, in all vehicle configurations, and you can get a sense of the complexity even before you start trying to calculate the permutations.
I’m going to apologise in advance for this one. There’s no way that I could adequately gather together everything I’ve learned about this process and express it in an educated manner. I feel embarrassed even trying, but I hope that you’ll still get a feel for what this is all about.
The Vertical Bench
There are two main test benches used in electrical integration. The first of these is known as the vertical bench.
The vertical bench looks like a cross between a dismembered car and a telephone switchboard. It’s based on a rack system that has all of the car’s components attached to it. Look closely in the photo above and you’ll see several different radios, climate control, rear-seat video screens, door handles, etc.
Here’s a quick look into how complex things are these days – the front door handles alone are involved in more than 10 different electrical systems within the Saab 9-5. And to think there was a time when all you did was unlock the vehicle with a mechanical key and step inside! Today, with passive entry, you do less work but the car does a lot of the work for you and that work is planned and tested here at electrical integration.
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Following on from the production communication from yesterday……
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Zeewolde, The Netherlands, 9 June 2011 – Saab Automobile AB (Saab Automobile) today decided to temporarily suspend production at its production facility in Trollhättan. The seven-week production stop in April and May has not just affected Saab Automobile, but particularly also its supplier base. While Saab Automobile booked lots of progress and reached agreements with the vast majority of its supplier base, negotiations with a number of suppliers on payment and delivery terms are still ongoing. These negotiations are expected to be finalized shortly.
Saab Automobile is working on a number of initiatives to secure further short and medium-term funding.
As communicated in the press release of May 27th, Saab Automobile anticipated production hiccups in the start-up phase which Saab Automobile has in fact experienced in the last few days. In order to avoid disruptions as a result of irregular inflows of certain components and parts, Saab Automobile has decided to temporary suspend production and will resume production as soon as possible once it has secured a more stable inflow of components and parts together with its supplier base.
Victor Muller, Chairman and CEO of Saab Automobile, said: “We anticipated that we would not see a smooth inflow of supplies as from the day we restarted production, May 27th, and communicated that in our press release of that day. We have a few thousand suppliers worldwide with each of whom we have to reach acceptable terms and conditions to resume production of parts and subsequent deliveries. Many suppliers are located outside Europe and re-stocking inevitably takes time.
“Thus far we have reached agreements with the vast majority of our suppliers and we are confident that we will reach agreement with all remaining suppliers in the coming days, thereby stabilizing our operations and our production in particular. However, it is not to be excluded that we will see production hiccups in the near future until the supply chain is fully back to normal. I reiterate our appreciation for our suppliers who are working with us constructively to come to terms and put our production back on track. At this moment, we have almost 10,000 orders on hand, including those for the Saab 9-4X which is currently being built in Mexico.”
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You’re currently at Inside Saab – the inside perspective on what’s going on from day to day here at Saab HQ in Trollhattan. I’m very humbled that you’ve taken the time to visit and I hope you enjoy your stay, tell all your friends and come back again.
But did you know that there are other official Saab channels out there and we’ve got various ways for you to keep in touch?
Saab.com
….because we’re a car company after all. Saab.com features the reason we’re in business, our outstanding cars. You can customise your own vehicles, spin them around for a 360-degree view and check out what else is happening around the company.
Saab Newsroom RSS feed
All of our corporate news in one place. If you want the official releases and none of the human interest stuff, the Saab Newsroom is the place to go. If you use an RSS reader, simply load the Newsroom RSS feed into your reader, hit ‘subscribe’ and you’ll have access to full posts that you can read when it suits you.
Saab Newsroom on Twitter
The Newsroom’s twitter feed is a way to keep up to date on all Newsroom postings if Twitter’s your thing.
Inside Saab RSS feed
Again, if you use an RSS reader (and it doesn’t have auto-discovery), simply load the Inside Saab RSS feed into your reader, hit ‘subscribe’ and you’ll have access to full posts that you can read when it suits you.
Inside Saab on Twitter
I tweet throughout the day, sometimes a lot and sometimes not. You can use the Inside Saab twitter feed to stay informed about when new posts are made on the Inside Saab website. I also post links to recommended reading elsewhere and the odd occasional tidbit about what’s going on inside Saab in real time.
Saab on Facebook
Saab’s Facebook page has nearly 90,000 fans and there is always something going on there. You can send us images of your car, participate in competitions and get local and global Saab news posted to your wall, receiving it whenever you log in. There are also links to events, galleries, downloadable wallpapers and much, much more.
Saab on Youtube
The Saab Cars Official Youtube page has a large selection of video content for you to enjoy. We use this content here on Inside Saab as well as on Facebook, but you can also browse the channel yourself and enjoy a rich media insight into our vehicles and our company. We have separate playlists on Youtube, too, so you can pick the subject that interests you most and head there first.
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We’re constantly developing our online presence and you can expect to see more ways to interact with Saab soon.
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A few weeks ago, I published a story about the birth of the Saab Convertible. The man at the center of that story was Bob Sinclair, the former chief of Saab Automobile in the United States.
A friend in the US has since sent through some pictures of a launch event that was held when Saab released the 20th Anniversary Edition of the Saab Convertible in April, 2006. The launch started at El Encanto Hotel in Santa Barbara, moving into a drive prior to lunch at the Latetia winery, following some of the scenery used for the movie Sideways (which featured a Saab 900 Convertible).
Bob Sinclair was invited along to share his Convertible story at the event.
Dick Lague from Ignition3 – a Saab owner living in Malibu, California – was present at the event and took these photos, which make for a wonderful compliment to Bob’s Convertible story from a few days ago.
Dick’s also emailed me his recollections from the event and for Saab historians, it makes for some great reading. I’ve added his notes after the photos.
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Bob speaking to the press corps gathered for the event in ……. you can see the first Saab convertible prototype (in white) built by the American Sunroof Company on the screen. This is the car now housed at the Saab Museum in Trollhattan, Sweden.
This red Saab 900 Convertible was on show at the launch. It was one of the first Saab convertibles to come off the production line as a 1986 model.
A group of five Saab convertibles ready for their test drive….
“Uncle Bob” with one of the later iterations of Saab’s iconic convertible.
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Recollections from the launch of the 20th Anniversary Saab 9-3 Convertible
by Dick Lague.
I remember how excited Bob Sinclair was about being invited to be part of the Saab convertible 20th anniversary edition introduction in Santa Barbara. We spoke on the phone sometime in March 2006 and told me of how pleased he was to be able to reflect on 20 years of production of “his baby” – the Saab Convertible.
The succession of Saab USA presidents after Bob retired did not seem to understand or appreciate Bob’s contribution to Saab, but this took an about face when Jay Spenchian took the position. It was Jay who thought that Bob could make this 20th Anniversary Convertible introduction in early April 2006, a very special event.
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Yesterday, production at Saab Automobile stopped at lunchtime due to material shortages. We have now stopped again today for the same reasons.
“When we chose to restart production after the long stoppage, we saw a number of risks on the horizon, mostly concerned with the supply of materials. We are faced with more material supply problems this week and have therefore changed plans for the remaining days of this week. During the stoppages that we expect will occur this week, we have planned for various activities at the factory, such as staff training” said the purchasing and production director Gunnar Brunius.
The liquidity situation is still tense, and depends on several different financing solutions falling into place, long-term as well as short-term. Some milestones have been achieved, such as the letter of intent signed with Pang Da and the additional funding that their order of Saab cars means. An example of things that still await a solution is the sale and leaseback of Saab AB Property, which we have addressed in previous communications. Representatives from Spyker and Saab will continue to work with these solutions, while the dialogue between Saab and suppliers progresses.
-Production is sensitive to, and therefore easily disturbed by these events and what direction they take. It may be that the situation changes from day to day, or even from hour to hour. It is therefore very difficult to make further predictions, but we have to take one day at a time. In order to avoid taking on more supplies than necessary, we have decided to reduce production plans this week. We are all working hard to get production running consistently again, and as soon as possible,” said Gunnar Brunius.
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I’ve been waiting to show you these photos for a while now.
What would you do if you saw something like this in a streetscape late at night?
You’d photograph it, of course. And that’s exactly what plenty of people did late one cold spring night in New York City. Me included.
Back in April when the New York Auto Show was on, Saab’s latest design concept, PhoeniX, was taken out at night for a photo shoot for Top Gear magazine. The car was unloaded at the meatpacking district around 10pm and so began an all-night photoshoot that didn’t actually finish until around 1pm the next day at Chelsea Piers.
The latest edition of Top Gear magazine, featuring the photos from that night, is now available at reputable magazine stands everywhere. That’s good news for you and I, because it means I can finally share these images, which I took during the first few hours of the shoot. For those who’d like to know, the car was parked just down the street from the Standard Hotel.
Click to enlarge and enjoy.
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