You might recall I was pretty excited in a previous post about the Saab deal with Konigsegg, given the interesting connection between the design arm of Konigsegg, Ecker design. Admittedly I am biased, having studied industrial design long ago.
Maybe Spyker Cars is an even better fit. With over one hundred years of history behind them, Spyker to me epotimises everything european about the car industry. Instead of building itself to a global comglomorate like Ford and GM, Spyker has quitely made unusal performance cars since the birth of the automobile industry. Merging with an aircraft maker prior to world war I, Spyker represents the long term view of European vs US business. I hope helps to keep SAAB alive.
SAAB was never a fit in the GM stable, so lets hope Spyker can get the brand out of it's blandness and back to the quirkly, interesting and well engineered vehicles that built the reputation in the first place. Maybe, like FIAT, SAAB will now thrive having escaped the corporate death sentance that belonging to the (old) GM entailed.
I'm sure the aeronautical connection will endear Spyker to all those quirky SAAB engineers (admitedly rumored to behind of SAABs, notorious cost overuns).
Perhaps some of the extravagent Spyker design will also rub off, making the SAAB brand interesting for the designers, architects and educated professionals that tended to be their traditional buyer demographic. Below is the gorgeous if slight outlandish Spyker Aileron. How many car companies are confident enough to put their companies latin corporate tag line actually on their car. ‘Nulla tenaci invia est via:’
‘For the tenacious no road is impassable’. Lets hope this holds true for SAAB as well.
1 comment:
I would be interested to see how spyker implements their superior design capabilities with automated manufacturing processes to add value for customers. I believe that Spyker only produces some 1000 cars anually so tackling the innovation curve on mass production might produce some interesting problems. Also, I would assume that they would keep the Saab brand intact, so as not to tarnish or deteriorate the pre-existing brand equity that they already have in place. I personally look forward to seeing how this whole scenario plays out over time. Good post.
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