GM Leaves Bankruptcy: Where Do the Brands Stand?
In the tumult of GM’s lightning-quick journey through bankruptcy, you may have lost track of what will happen to all the individual brands. Therefore, here’s a quick and handy guide to where each brand currently stands as the new taxpayer-owned GM emerges from Chapter 11.
Saturn: Purchased by the Penske Automotive Group, which owns NASCAR and IndyCar racing teams, as well as the U.S. distribution arm of the Smart car brand. Saturn’s five models will become the property of Penske but will still be built by GM on a contract basis. According to reports, GM will continue production of the three best-selling Saturn models for the next two years: the Aura, Vue and Outlook. It will discontinue the Sky and Astra. By 2011, GM will stop producing Saturn vehicles, and Penske will have to find a new manufacturer — possibly Renault Samsung Motors of Korea, according to Automotive News.
Saab: Swedish supercar maker Koenigsegg led a consortium to purchase the ailing brand from GM. The deal is contingent on $600 million of financing from the European Investment Bank to be guaranteed by Sweden. The deal is supposed to close sometime in the third quarter of this year, but analysts have questioned whether Saab is big enough to survive regardless. It sold only 93,000 cars last year and has been unprofitable for a long time.
“Old Smokey” from Fort Worth, Texas, has a name that makes it sound like he owns a rusted-out pickup truck, but in fact he’s a proud owner of a 2009 Pontiac Vibe GT. Old Smokey likes his Vibe quite a bit, from the gas mileage to the power he can coax from the engine. Find out what else tickles Smokey about the Vibe by reading his full review. After you finish that, head over 


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