How the Saturn deal fell apart

[rickaren]

How the Saturn deal fell apart; default a shock

Posted on Wednesday, November 25th, 2009 at 12:15 PM EST. (Employee News)

“Somebody got cold feet” at French carmaker Renault, Tom LaSorda told the Detroit Free Press.

And just like that, the Saturn automobile brand was toast, because Renault suddenly nixed a deal Sept. 30 to supply Saturn dealers with vehicles after General Motors stopped, the paper said. Even Roger Penske couldn’t save the brand GM launched in 1990 to fight imports, the Free Press columnist Tom Walsh noted.

“We were shocked,” LaSorda, the former Chrysler president who was working with Penske in a handshake arrangement, told the Free Press in his first public comments on the aborted Saturn sale. A joint news statement was drafted for 7 a.m. release on Sept. 30, Walsh wrote. “So we figure everything’s fine, everybody’s happy, we had the legal documents all done,” LaSorda recalled to him Tuesday.

Penske Automotive Group’s purchase of the Saturn car brand from General Motors had just crashed Sept. 30, derailed by French automaker Renault’s last-minute balk on a deal to supply future cars to Saturn from South Korea, the story said. (Detroit Free Press)