NC 91 Z28

Shares up sharply amid hope for union discussions

After a year and a half of mediocre performance, GM’s share price is making a strong comeback, rising about 50 percent from a low seen in late 2005

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19558370/

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I've considered GM recovered ever since they fixed the mess that Delphi management turned into a clusterf**k.

GM's problem was very simple and straightforward: they put money into trucks at the expense of cars and they had an product approval organization that was overly conservative and shortsighted and took an incredibly long time to approve anything.

Since then, GM has fixed that problem. Their product pipeline is limited only by the cash they have available, they have someone who's damn near a financial Houdini running the company who has the brains to know to leave the car developing to the car guys. You have a product chief who so independently stinking rich he's not worried about his job, so old he's making this job his go-for-broke swan song, and filled with so much car industry experience he's getting amazing results. You have a design chief that as a kid used to spend hours in his room drawing cars, a labor negotiating team that was probally the only group of people on the planet that could fix Delphi's labor dispute and get it back on the road to profitability (something Delphi's own management should have done).

GM's in it's golden age right now. Years into the future, I feel people will look back at this period at GM and realize the stars lined up just right for them.

Unfortunately, because of the length of time it takes to get a new product through the system today at any car company, although we're only starting to see the results today (Saturn Aura, is one of the 1st volume vehicles developed completely under Lutz-Welburn, everything else was already in progress), the best of their cars will be hitting the streets after the team has broken up via either moving on, moving to other positions, or retired.



Ford's problem is the NIH (Not Invented Here) syndrome and the fact that previous management did everything in their power to make it impossible to mix models and markets. Ford has a history of spending $10 to make a $1 part and making seemingly similar things very different. Things inside Ford are also guided by who you know and politics. Ford also waited too long to start fixing things. Bill Ford never made a trip to Ford Australia till last Fall. Ford hired an outsider and had to specifically say in his contract that he had the freedom to do whatever was necessary to save the company to prevent him from turning them down.... a second time.

Chrysler's business model focuses on Jeeps and Dodge trucks even moreso than when Bob Eaton soldout Chrysler (10% of the US market share, the world's lowest cost manufacturer, & the US auto manufacturer with the biggest hord of stockpiled cash) to Mercedes Benz (1% of the US market, a CEO with ambitious expansion plans, and in need of money to finance it) then retired very wealthy the following year while Chrysler began to get dismantaled.

It can be argued that the LX cars were a fluke. They are extremely well made (for an American car let alone a Chrysler), have good interior materials, and have been free of any bad publicity or recalls, have been embraced by current pop culture, and car magazines tend to love them......
....then you look at the rest of Chrysler's new car lineup and wonder what happened!

GM's in good shape, and it's just now a matter of keeping the path clear.

Ford's got Toyota beat in quality surveys. Now it has to actually make cars people want outside of the Mustang and get of the Keystone Cops management style they've had over the past few years.

A couple of months ago, I was comtemplating selling my Chrysler stock because outside of the Challenger I saw no real future there. The new Sebring sucks (it's ugly and it's interior, while nice looking, is incredibly cheap), Avenger is nothing more than a Charger body on a Sebring (hardly creative), their concept cars (insight to thier design department and management's opinion of what will sell) have left me , Dakota has gone downhill in styling and image, Ram's restyling was at best. To make things worse, they actually considered killing the PT Cruiser... if it were a car, it's overall one of Chrysler's top selling vehicles behind the 300 & Charger.

But today, Chrysler suddenly has no debt. It suddenly doesn't have to worry about scratching to fund it's upcoming cars. It can unload it's stockpiled unsold 2007 cars as "used vehicles" at dealerships, rental agencies, and at auctions. It doesn't even have to answer to stockholders anymore. Seemingly all the old Chrysler talent is drifting back to "advisory" positions at Cerberus to "help". Tom Gale, Chrysler designer extroninaire will be advising on some of the more questionable designs that were headed to production. Quality & materials improvements are likely to streach beyond the LX cars.

Chrysler's future looks pretty bright right now, but it's going to take a few years.

I think Chrysler is goin