GM cancels L.A. auto show debut

General Motors has made the L.A. Auto Show shine a little less brightly.

The cash-starved automaker said today that it would cancel its only news conference at the annual event, originally planned as the North American debut of the Saab 9-X Air BioHybrid Convertible. The executive who was to conduct the reveal of the concept car, Vice Chairman Bob Lutz, also will not be attending the show, which opens to the public Nov. 21. The vehicle will be on display at the show, however, just without a flashy introduction.

The company described the cutback as a cost-saving measure. In the third quarter, GM burned through cash so quickly -- about $2.3 billion per month -- that executives predicted that, without outside help, it would run out of cash sometime in the first two quarters of next year.

Now the automaker is lobbying Washington for help, and Congress, as well as President-elect Barack Obama, is pushing for $50 billion or more in low-interest loans, or for other financing alternatives. Meanwhile, GM has dramatically cut back on production and other expenses and has reduced product-development expenditures.

The Saab concept car had its worldwide debut at the Paris Motor Show in October. Last year, GM debuted three cars at the L.A. show. The fact that it will officially debut zero vehicles in the single largest auto market in the U.S. is another reminder of the industry's dire situation.

-- Ken Bensinger

Photo: Saab 9-X Air BioHybrid Convertible. Credit: General Motors

Comments

[RoscoPeeholePain]

i'm still confused why it's taken GM years to develop the volt when they already had an all electric car with a 65 mile range. oh but wait, they destroyed all of the EV-1s. so now we have to bail these morons out? why should we be on the hook for their incompetence. if i go to vegas and blow all my money on a bad bet can i ask for a bailout?

[Throopspeed]

This has been the problem for many years, since I was a lad and we had to swerve for dinosaurs. Money has an absolute rule, it will go where it is most efficiently used. Which in this case is to buy better cars. There are just not enough dumbsh*ts left anymore to buy America first, while putting their own self interest second. Americans can easily build good cars, why our Toyotas, Hondas, Hyundais, Mercedes, BMWS , Nissans, Subarus et al we make here are great! So no more excuses Big 2 or 3, compete or well, you do the math.....

[martscan]

Why did GM scrap the EV-1 and sell the battery technology and patents to Chevron Oil?

[fzdybel]

Gee, remember when you wanted the biggest SUV on the block, because that was so much kinder on your little ego than driving a minivan? Because it made you feel safer? Because you like to look down on the rest of traffic? Because you needed room for all your "stuff," plus 7000 lb towing capacity? With four wheel drive to take you anywhere, which mainly turned out just to be the nearest mall? Seems like only yesterday. In terms of amortizing automotive designs and tooling, it *was* only yesterday. Now you want to tap dance on GM managements' heads for not building what you didn't want to buy, at margins that weren't particularly profitable.

Apart from the petroleum price spike, what's really been killing GM is the lack of universal health care in this country.

[Sandy Crane]

The us executive branch consistantly shielded us automakers from economy and emission standards that would have made them more competitive in todays market.
The automakers spent millions trying to convince us that we wanted to drive dynosaurs. They do deserve the failure they now have.
But... we cannot afford to dismantle our largest manufacturing base and sell it to China. The new administration must help the car makers design and manufacture a product that is competitive in a world where efficiency and practicality are valued.

[chuckb]

All the people who want to see the american auto industry fail are complete idiots. The economy is bad as it is and putting millions of more people out of work is stupid. Gm and Ford are making some of the best cars on the road right now. On KBB the other day the Malibu won against Honda, Toyota, Ford, and everyone else in their midsize segment comparison. The only way to make america great again it to support american products and the people that make them. For every 100 cars sold by the gm,ford, chrysler it keeps 24 people employed. For every foreign it is on 14. Because they only assemble some cars here. The parts come from overseas.

[Johnsy]

Too bad about the car, but no one will miss that windbag Lutz and all his reality-denying spin.

[Reilly Schanno]

No big surprise here. GM is running and running scared. Where's the guarantee that the bailout money they are going to get from that conniving Pelosi won't be squandered? You really think these cost cuts are going to do the trick? They need serious cost cuts, not this penny-ante crap. If they don't care enough about their consumers to display their vehicles proudly, then I say forget about 'em. We can all live with the imports as the dominant U.S. vehicles. I still drive my 1988 Datsun and it's never let me down.

[tara]

GM et al. have been in COLLUSION with Big Oil. The U.S. Auto industry bet on fossil fuels and the oil cos. have relished all the phat suvs hummers, and gas-guzzling monsters coming out of Detroit. Still, we can't afford the millions of jobs lost based on Detroit's failures. INSIST on the production of fuel efficient, hybrid vehicles in exchange for the bailout, and let the blood-letting begin at the executive level. The autoworker unions need to get a clue: the world is in a recession and there is no room for inflated wages.

[Tommy]

GM and the other Detroit car makers have had over twenty years to learn JIT and compete with Toyota. GM is incapable of learning how to manufacture autos efficiently and effectively.

[dss]

I'm still driving my 1995 Mercury Mystique and it's only need one major repair in all this time (catalyic converter). I'll always buy American provided they're producing the kind of car I want. And my next car will be a plug-n hybrid, unless something better comes along.

I think theres enough blame to spread around. The consumers are at fault here as well... buying the low milagae SUVs sent out the message that we don't care what we pay for gas. Detroit acted like that would never change and wasn't planning ahead soon enough.

[Winfieldl J. Abbe]

Yes, GM, Ford and Chrysler deserve to be criticized. Yes, the unions can be criticized. But just remember this, as a poster mentioned above: You and I live in America, not China, Indonesia, Mexico, Africa, Israel, Iraq or anywhere else, but America. America must come first.
The unions you criticize are made up of Americans, often struggling themselves with high medical and other costs.
Does anyone remember the other great automobile company Packard? Packard Motor Company was one of the greatest automobile companies on the planet. It made huge patriotic sacrifices for the "cause" during world war II. It often was not adequately compensated for all the efforts to produce the great engines for airplanes, the cooperative effort with Rolls Royce in England, where our tooling had to be matched to their's, an almost insurmountable problem; but one they solved.
Think about it: Where did all the war materiel, guns, planes, tanks, trucks, etc., come from in world war II? Did they grow on trees? No, most of them were produced by the great automobile companies of the U.S.
Are we never to be in a war again? How do you know?
What will you do order all the equipment from China, Israel, Indonesia, Africa, ...? Are you crazy? Have all of you lost your senses?
Have you been to a car show lately of classic cars? Do you know who manufactured them? Yes, our great automobile companies made them.
Americans are the most selfish, dumbed down people on the planet. All they care about is the next football game and cold beer to kill what few brain cells they have left after graduating from that college with all that "higher" education from those goofy professors.
Most of our manufacturing capacity has been stripped from us now. Our security is basically gone. Let these great companies go now, and this is likely the end of the line. Remember, all the remaining companies, while having plants here, are foreign owned. They are controlled from abroad.
Obviously the inmates have taken over the asylum.

Winfield J. Abbe, PH.D., Physics
Athens, GA

[Rex]

Detroit automakers going back to the mid-sixties and smog-pollution failed to take their industry, government or consumer's seriously. Detroit dominated economically from a franchise that served up monthly billions in cash revenues. There was simply no incentives to change. HUMMER H3 in-your-face gambit thumbed foreign competition with American automotive arrogance.

Goodbye and good riddence, if they can't design and build the transportation American's need.

[Don]

GM and Chrysler may soon go the way of the dodo, and Ford too if it is not careful, but Americans will still be buying cars. And most of these cars will be manufactured in the good old US of A by Toyota, Honda, DaimlerBenz, BMW, etc. What's the problem with that? None at all. Americans will still do the manufacturing; only the nameplates will change. What's so sacrosanct about the Big Three? Nothing. Some communities in America will suffer, sure, but others will benefit. America has been exporting to other countries for years, sometimes by force, at great expense to indigenous industries. Now we may have to take a bit of that same medicine. We'd better live with it.

[dfs]

Maybe GM should look to OPEC to bail them out. GM has made them a lot of money.

[tomato]

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If you purchased Hummer H2, you get Aveo FREE.
Buy those thirsty GMC Trucks, get Aveo FREE.
In addition, customers also have the options to upgrade, such as getting Cobalt for whatever the different.

The purpose is to stimulate flow of inventory, while minimizing giving away rebates, which will cut revenues.