A year after emerging from bankruptcy, Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne said he felt confident about the company’s future and announced the addition of 1,100 new jobs at an assembly plant going back more than century.
“This is a signature vehicle for Chrysler,” Chrysler and Fiat chief Sergio Marchionne told reporters on Friday, as the automakers showed off the 2011 Grand Cherokee, the company’s first new vehicle in nearly a year.
“I don’t worry about the world economy,” Marchionne said when asked about chances that economic troubles in Europe could undermine the US economic recovery, which Chrysler is counting on too boost sales.
PHOTO: REUTERS
The new Grand Cherokee features an all new V6 engine that gets 9.8km per liter on the highway.
Marchionne also said after the official launch ceremony, which drew a host of exuberant local politicians, that Chrysler has ample orders to support the production on a second shift.
“We have enough orders,” said Marchionne, adding that part of the production would be exported around the world through Fiat’s distribution network.
“Based on what I see now, I don’t see any reason why we should not go public [next year],” he said.
“But don’t ask me which month,” Marchionne added.
Chrysler is also looking at ways to refinance the other part of the loans from the US Treasury that rescued the automaker from bankruptcy one year ago. But it’s very complicated matter, Marchionne said.
“They were designed to provide long-term relief to Chrysler. So before we shut down the financing source, we better be sure about what we’re doing,” he said.
However, the debt is very expensive for Chrysler, he added.
In other news, the US Treasury Department has hired Lazard Freres & Co as its adviser to prepare for an initial public stock offering (IPO) by General Motors Co (GM).
The Treasury signed the agreement on Monday but did not reveal it until Friday.
The agreement said that the New York-based investment bank would analyze and review alternatives for the government’s ownership stake, including giving advice on the use of “underwriters, brokers or other capital market advisers for the best means and structure to dispose of such assets.”
The United Auto Workers had used Lazard Freres to evaluate GM’s books before contract talks in 2007. Lazard Freres told the union that GM’s economic situation was worse than the company was maintaining.
The Treasury owns 61 percent of GM. The IPO would allow the government to begin recouping its investment. GM CEO Ed Whitacre has said he expects an IPO late this year or early next year.
To keep GM afloat and get it through bankruptcy court, the US government gave the company US$50 billion. GM repaid US$6.7 billion that the government considered loans. The remaining US$43.3 billion was converted to the 61 percent stake.
On Monday, GM’s chief financial officer Chris Liddell, who was hired recently from Microsoft Corp, said an IPO could occur over the next 12 months if things fell into place.
“Certainly over the next year, there’s a possibility we could do an IPO, but the market’s got to be ready, the automobile industry has to continue to improve and we have to continue to improve,” Liddell said.
When an apartment comes up for rent in Germany’s big cities, hundreds of prospective tenants often queue down the street to view it, but the acute shortage of affordable housing is getting scant attention ahead of today’s snap general election. “Housing is one of the main problems for people, but nobody talks about it, nobody takes it seriously,” said Andreas Ibel, president of Build Europe, an association representing housing developers. Migration and the sluggish economy top the list of voters’ concerns, but analysts say housing policy fails to break through as returns on investment take time to register, making the
‘SILVER LINING’: Although the news caused TSMC to fall on the local market, an analyst said that as tariffs are not set to go into effect until April, there is still time for negotiations US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that he would likely impose tariffs on semiconductor, automobile and pharmaceutical imports of about 25 percent, with an announcement coming as soon as April 2 in a move that would represent a dramatic widening of the US leader’s trade war. “I probably will tell you that on April 2, but it’ll be in the neighborhood of 25 percent,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago club when asked about his plan for auto tariffs. Asked about similar levies on pharmaceutical drugs and semiconductors, the president said that “it’ll be 25 percent and higher, and it’ll
CHIP BOOM: Revenue for the semiconductor industry is set to reach US$1 trillion by 2032, opening up opportunities for the chip pacakging and testing company, it said ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光投控), the world’s largest provider of outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) services, yesterday launched a new advanced manufacturing facility in Penang, Malaysia, aiming to meet growing demand for emerging technologies such as generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications. The US$300 million facility is a critical step in expanding ASE’s global footprint, offering an alternative for customers from the US, Europe, Japan, South Korea and China to assemble and test chips outside of Taiwan amid efforts to diversify supply chains. The plant, the company’s fifth in Malaysia, is part of a strategic expansion plan that would more than triple
Taiwanese artificial intelligence (AI) server makers are expected to make major investments in Texas in May after US President Donald Trump’s first 100 days in office and amid his rising tariff threats, Taiwan Electrical and Electronic Manufacturers’ Association (TEEMA, 台灣電子電機公會) chairman Richard Lee (李詩欽) said yesterday. The association led a delegation of seven AI server manufacturers to Washington, as well as the US states of California, Texas and New Mexico, to discuss land and tax issues, as Taiwanese firms speed up their production plans in the US with many of them seeing Texas as their top option for investment, Lee said. The
RSS