Saleen says auction is not a fire sale

As Mark Twain might say — if he’d been in the business of building high-performance automobiles — news of Saleen Inc.’s demise appears to be greatly exaggerated.

Last month, websites aimed at specialty car buffs were circulating reports of an auction of Saleen property that smelled suspiciously like the kind of fire sale that accompanies a bankruptcy filing. Besides the usual cache of chairs, desks, filing cabinets and other office essentials, the auction catalog for the niche automaker included machine tools, car parts and — gasp! — 20 vehicles.

Saleen exec Marques McCammon, while acknowledging that his firm is dealing with some of the same woes as their larger car-making brethren, insists the company isn't on the brink of insolvency. In a recent memo, McCammon ticked off a list of current and upcoming Saleen projects, including a refreshed four-vehicle lineup for 2009, launch of the new Racecraft performance marque and continued development of its S5S Raptor supercar, above.

“Now, I may not be the brightest guy, but I would guess that you don’t make these kind of investments/announcements if you are planning on closing your doors in a month,” McCammon wrote.

In fact, he hinted in an interview Thursday that the other rumor floating around about Saleen — that the company may be a bidder for Chrysler’s Viper sports car business — may be true.

So what’s with the auction?

According to McCammon, the private equity firm that owns Saleen, L.A.-based Hancock Park Associates, last year bought Michigan automotive component supplier ASC Inc. Besides being the catalyst for moving the company’s center of gravity from Irvine to suburban Detroit, the deal left the firms with a heap of redundant office supplies, car parts and factory equipment.