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Saab subsidiary avoids bankruptcy

Saab subsidiary Saab Automobile Tools has avoided collapse after reaching an agreement with a supplier which had earlier on Friday applied for the firm to be declared bankrupt.

Saab subsidiary avoids bankruptcy

Saab announced on Friday that the two parties had reached an agreement over payment.

An official at Vänersborg District Court in western Sweden confirmed on Friday that an application had been filed by SwePart Verktyg AB for Saab Automobile Tools AB to be declared bankrupt.

“Many of us are in the same boat. And what can you do when the other party does not get back to you?” said Swepart Verktyg chairperson Lars Thunberg on the decision to apply to the court.

According to Thunberg, the claim is for a total of 5 million kronor ($800,000). He added that Saab had repeatedly assured the firm that the liability would be met, with the last promised deadline on June 2nd.

When the payment had not arrived on June 8th, Thunberg and Swepart Tools lost patience with the beleaguered car maker.

“It broke my trust,” Thunberg said.

“I do not want them to go out of business, that you have to understand, for it would be terrible. But for us, who are a small company, this constitutes a lot of money.”

Saab Tools and Saab Parts were formed in order to facilitate guarantees for loans from the European Investment Ban (EIB).

The subsidiaries have lent a total of at least 800 million kronor to Saab Automobile, according to the local Göteborgsåposten daily.

Saab Automobile is the sole owner of Saab Automobile Tools AB and the application was the first to be filed against a Saab firm.

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CARS

Former Swedish Saab bosses appear in court

Swedish car maker Saab's former CEO Jan Åke Jonsson and the firm's former head lawyer Kristina Geers have appeared in court in Vänersborg in west Sweden, accused of falsifying financial documents shortly before the company went bankrupt in 2011.

Former Swedish Saab bosses appear in court
Saab's former CEO Jan Åke Jonsson. Photo: Karin Olander/TT
The pair are accused of falsifying the paperwork at the height of the Swedish company's financial difficulties at the start of the decade.
 
A third person – who has not been named in the Swedish media – is accused of assisting them by issuing false invoices adding up to a total of 30 million kronor ($3.55m).
 
According to court documents, the charges relate to the firm's business in Ukraine and the paperwork in question was signed just before former CEO Jan Åke Jonsson resigned.
 
Both Jonsson and Saab's former head lawyer Kristina Geers have admitted signing the papers but denied knowledge of the Ukranian firm implicated in the case.
 
All three suspects deny all the charges against them.
 

Saab's former head lawyer Kristina Geers. Photo:  Björn Larsson Rosvall/TT
 
Saab filed for bankruptcy at the end of 2011, after teetering on the edge of collapse for nearly two years.
 
Chief prosecutor Olof Sahlgren told the court in Vänersborg on Wednesday that the alleged crimes took place in March 2011, when Saab was briefly owned by the Dutch company Spyker Cars.
  
It was eventually bought by National Electric Vehicle Sweden (Nevs), a Chinese-owned company after hundreds of staff lost their jobs.
 
The car maker, which is based in west Sweden, has struggled to resolve serious financial difficulties by attracting new investors since the takeover.
 
In October 2014 it announced it had axed 155 workers, close to a third of its workforce.
 
Since 2000, Saab automobile has had no connection with the defence and aeronautics firm with the same name. It only produces one model today, the electric 9-3 Aero Sedan, mainly targeting the Chinese market.