Saab Takeover Complete, Will Build Electric Vehicles For Chinese Market

The Saab saga entered a new chapter this week with news that the beleaguered Swedish brand's sale to National Electric Vehicle Sweden has been completed. NEVS will take control of the majority of the automaker's production facilities, inventory, and intellectual property following its recent bankruptcy and divestiture by previous owner Spyker.

What does NEVS plan to do with a bruised and battered Saab? Initially the plan is for the company to produce an all-electric vehicle that will make use of the Saab 9-3 platform. This compact vehicle is not intended for sale in Saab's traditional markets, but will instead be aimed at Chinese buyers. Despite its Scandinavian-sounding name, NEVS features a Chinese connection through its ownership - National Modern Energy Holdings Ltd., which is run by Kai Johan Jiang, a Hong Kong-based business mogul.

The deal follows a series of failed takeover and sales attempts from other Chinese companies intent on benefiting from Saab's institutional knowledge in order to become more competitive in their home market. General Motors played a key role in protecting designs that it stated it had co-developed with Saab from falling into the hands of the rivals of its own Chinese operations, creating a legal controversy that culminated in a multi-billion dollar lawsuit against GM by Spyker.

As part of an effort to distinguish the new company from the old, and as the result of an agreement between NEVS and the Saab aerospace and heavy truck concerns, the new vehicles will not wear the distinctive griffin-head logo that previously graced Saab models. This is unlikely to be an issue in China, where Saab's past is virtually unknown, but it could also serve to provide the company with a fresh start in North America and Europe should the electric vehicles ever return to the brand's original stomping grounds.