Thursday, January 21, 2010

What is GM doing?

To tell you the truth I am very disappointed about GM. Let me explain you why.

In 2009 GM was in a very critical situation and needed help from US Government. They got it...dozens of billions of dollars, Governmental help.

Then, they decided last summer to sell Opel/Vauxhall, a very important brand in Europe. They started negotiation with Magna (a Canadian car parts company) and Sversbank (a Russian state bank). In these negotiations were involved also the German authorities. Suddenly the GM officials changed their mind and cut all negotiations involving Opel.


GM is also the owner of Swedish auto manufacturer SAAB. They wanted to sell it too, so the negotiations started with different bidders but only one of them was than selected - Koenigsegg (I know, pretty hard to pronounce it). Koenigsegg is a Swedish super-car manufacturer. After many talks, GM started to have more and more demands from Koenigsegg, so the Swedish bidder dropped the negotiations. A new bidder came along and wanted to buy SAAB. This bidder was also a super-car manufacturer, like Koenigsegg, but Dutch and with a dog's name: Spyker. GM considers that the new bidder was not good enough so they rejected the offer. However, Spyker, like a dog that did not want to give up his bone, made another bid. Again, GM rejected the offer and they conclude that nobody is good enough to buy SAAB, and as if a mad husband said that if he cannot have SAAB, nobody will have it...so they will kill it. Sad, isn't it?

Now, we find out that GM has not finish giving bad news to its employees from Europe. Today they announced that the Opel factory from Antwerp, Belgium is going to be close and more than 2.600 people will lose their job.

It is very interesting how GM does things. On the Buick carmaker website, they say that are going to launch a new model named Regal, a model based on Opel Insignia, a very successful model. Opel engineers developed Insignia and after their great job; GM taught they could give a great bonus to Opel...SHUTTING DOWN THE PLANT FROM ANTWERP!!!

Does anybody understand what is GM doing? What are the CEO's, Officers and Managers have in their heads?

GM lost $88 billion between 2005 and 2008 and now they have to sell everything. I wonder what will be the next step/shock that GM will make.

Monday, January 18, 2010

Haiti crisis


At this hour, everybody heard about the Haiti earthquake. It's interesting how in these difficult times for this Haitian people, there are others that try to "earn" money with scams about raising support for Haiti, using this crisis as a "gold mine".

If you want to be part of the people who want to help with money, make sure that you know something about the organization that does this. Try to find out some information about the organization, so your money will get where it supposed.

I do not want to give any links to different organizations involved in helping Haiti; I only want to make you aware of what is happening around Haiti situation.

Please pray for Haiti nation as it is going probably through the worst time of its history. Pray that all funds and help raised by all organizations will get where they supposed.