If the partnership moves ahead, look for Renault to get a version of the diminutive four-door.

Smart is no stranger to the four-door segment as it produced the ForFour between 2004 and 2006. However, sales weren’t as good as expected, forcing Smart to pull the plug on the project. No word on when the new-age ForFour might bow.

Smart is also said to be working on a sportier three seat model dubbed the ForThree.

Penske is the highly successful head of Bloomfield Hills-based Penske Automotive Group, Inc., which operates more than 300 franchises in the United States and internationally, selling 40 different brands. The billionaire Detroit booster, who oversaw the city’s Super Bowl XL preparation, has accomplished almost everything in the auto industry, from racing cars to building engines as owner of Detroit Diesel Corp. to snagging exclusive U.S. distribution rights for the iconic Smart minicar. But buying a brand and building vehicles would pose a new challenge.

“We look at things all the time,” said Tony Pordon, a spokesman for Penske Automotive Group. “We have been offered an opportunity to look at Saturn. It’s very premature to assume anything will be done. I can confirm to you that we are looking at it.”

Further details were not available Monday but Penske’s interest surfaced along with that of an Ohio investment group that hopes to acquire the brand. The Ohio group is scheduled to meet with Saturn officials today to discuss its proposal to build vehicles using union workers at U.S. factories targeted for closure by the Detroit automaker.

The new suitors bring star power and diversity to a pool of candidates bidding to buy Saturn, a customer-friendly but underperforming brand that GM plans to eliminate this year unless it can be sold.

“(Penske’s) a shrewd businessman and has proven himself time and again,” auto analyst Aaron Bragman of IHS Global Insight said Monday. “He’s a bit of a local hero the way he cleaned up Detroit for the Super Bowl, but what he can do with a brand like Saturn, I’m not exactly sure.

“I really don’t understand how any group thinks they can make Saturn a success when GM, with all its skills and vehicles and brand power and marketing muscle, could not.”

Last week, GM President and Chief Executive Officer Fritz Henderson said there were investors who had submitted “concepts” for acquiring Saturn and its retailer network.

Until now, only one potential buyer has been publicly identified: Telesto Ventures wants to partner with a foreign manufacturer and import vehicles under the Saturn name.

The group, which includes Oklahoma City-based private equity firm Black Oak Partners LLC and several Saturn dealers, submitted a bid last month, terms of which were not made public. Telesto proposes initially distributing GM-built vehicles through Saturn’s 439 dealerships in North America and eventually offering small, fuel-efficient vehicles produced by several manufacturers, most of which would be sold under the Saturn brand.

The Ohio group is interested in buying North American factories that might close during the automaker’s restructuring and make new vehicles that would be sold under the Saturn name.

“We will not export these jobs,” said one of the Ohio partners, who did not want to be identified. “Some might criticize us and say this can’t be viable, but we believe it can.”
GM prepares to review bids

GM is preparing to review proposals from several Saturn bidders and has hired an adviser to secure a deal later this year, the company said Monday.

The automaker hired S.J. Girsky & Co. to help with the transaction. The firm is headed by Stephen Girsky, who has been an adviser to the United Auto Workers and GM, and is a well-known former auto analyst for Morgan Stanley.

GM did not identify the other interested parties but will continue to look at proposals until early June.

The list will be narrowed to three or four in hopes of securing a deal by perhaps the end of the third quarter, Saturn spokesman Steve Janisse said Monday.

Janisse would not comment on any particular suitor.

“There are a number of potential investors interested in Saturn and we are having discussions with them,” Janisse said.

GM, which is subsisting on $15.4 billion in federal loans, is shedding brands as it restructures. The automaker is focusing on four core marques — Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick and GMC — and eliminating or trying to sell Saturn, Saab, Hummer and Pontiac.
Ohio group has Big 3 ties

The Ohio group has a broad background in the auto industry and includes current and former senior managers from Detroit’s Big Three automakers. The group also includes private financial backers, chemists and engineers who hail from Michigan, Ohio, Indiana and Florida.

The group is willing to work with the UAW and accept some legacy costs, which include such things as retiree health care and pensions, to ensure affordable and “highly fuel efficient vehicles with a good safety record” continue to be made by the union, the Ohio partner said.

“We believe there was a promise made to the employees of General Motors that provided a certain amount of benefits for retirees,” the partner said. “To take that away is not only unprofessional and a violation of trust, but it’s wrong.”

The group would need to contract with GM to supply vehicles initially.

The investors have proposed using Saturn dealerships in North America, though perhaps on a smaller scale depending on the profitability and location of the retail outlet.

“There has to be a dealership-by-dealership review,” the partner said.

The group also is looking at possibly acquiring factories that might be closed by Chrysler LLC, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy last week.

“Not all of those facilities may be viable, but the idea of shipping everything from overseas is not us,” the source said.

The group has started talking to people in Washington about possible assistance available at the federal and state level to keep the plants open. “We are very dedicated, first of all, to building a quality product,” the source said. “It will be everything that Saturn was when it was being launched and more.”

Selling Saturn is just one facet of a broader restructuring plan GM is rushing to finalize before June 1 or face a possible Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing. It is trying to get unsecured bondholders to agree to swap $27 billion in debt for a 10 percent equity stake in the company though bondholders countered and are seeking a 58 percent stake.

Henderson essentially rejected the counteroffer, saying the U.S. Treasury Department only authorized GM to offer a 10 percent stake.

“It’s outside of what the Treasury has told us they would support,” Henderson told the Associated Press on Monday. “It’s about as factual as I can be.”

“In 2009, the global economy will shrink for the first time since World War II,” Chief Executive Dieter Zetsche told Daimler’s shareholders at the company’s annual meeting in Berlin.

“The automotive industry didn’t cause this crisis, but is feeling the full brunt of its impact and suppliers and dealers are suffering just as much as manufacturers,” he told some 7,000 shareholders gathered in the cavernous Berlin ITB Messe. “Ultimately, nobody will go unscathed by an economic crisis.”

Zetsche said the Stuttgart-based company, whose brands include Mercedes-Benz, Smart, Maybach and AMG, was poised to take “all the required measures,” to remain strong, including more cost saving and efficiency plans besides the ones it has already announced.

Daimler said it would stick with rigid cost management and reduced labor costs, including management pay cuts, but did not provide a figure on how much savings the plan would create.

Daimler also reiterated it expects a first-quarter loss, because of the economic meltdown’s pinch on the automotive industry, but didn’t provide any figures. In February, the company posted a fourth-quarter loss of euro1.53 billion — its first in two years.

Daimler’s full-year 2008 revenue slid 12 percent to euro23.2 billion compared with euro26.5 billion in 2007.

As a result, the company plans to reduce its dividend by 70 percent to 60 euro cents a share compared with the euro2 a share it paid last year.

The company didn’t provide a more detailed outlook, citing the uncertainty of the global economy. However, it said the company does expect a gradual improvement in earnings through the rest of this year.

That did not mollify some shareholders, many of whom interrupted Zetsche’s speech with protests and condemnations of the company’s performance and that of its managers. Other shareholders yelled for people in the crowd to “shut up!”

“Write down your question so you won’t forget,” Zetsche responded.

Earlier this month, Daimler said it hoped to save euro2 billion ($2.7 billion) in personnel costs by cutting work time for 73,000 workers — largely administrative staff — in Germany by as much as five hours a week, but did not plan to eliminate jobs.

Those plans are unrelated to the previously announced decision to put some 50,000 automotive production workers on shorter hours. Daimler has said it also plans to put another 18,000 commercial vehicle workers on shorter hours after Easter. German companies often reduce hours worked to scale back output.

The cost cut announcements cheered investors, sending shares of Daimler up nearly 5 percent at euro23.57 in Frankfurt trading.

The Ford Ka is smaller than the Mini. It is roughly the size of a Smart car, except less expensive. It has never been introduced in North America, but has been selling in Europe in great numbers over the past few years.

The Ka is very comparable in size to the Ford Aspire or the Ford Festiva. Small, nimble, good on gas and easy to park. What else do you need in downtown traffic?

If you don’t have the budget to buy a hybrid or a full blown electric car, the Ka might blow you away in terms of efficiency while having a low initial purchase price.

Watch out Kia, Ford is coming!

Pictures of the Ka: