Plans by General Motors to strip its European Opel, Vauxhall and Saab subsidiaries of responsibility for engineering and manufacturing should be finalised about July 1st, the US carmaker said last week.
The shake-up of the loss-making German, British and Swedish companies will concentrate power at the Zurich headquarters of GM Europe, under incoming chairman Fritz Henderson, who is currently running the Asian operations.
GM has repeatedly said it is disappointed by the progress of its European businesses in trying to reduce hefty losses. However, a spokesman said the restructuring was not designed to cut costs, but to improve management and lower development time. There were likely to be some job losses as overlaps were reduced, but these had not yet been calculated.
People close to the company said the three European companies were likely to become little more than sales organisations as factories and development centres began reporting directly to Zurich-based management.
But legal requirements related to employee consultations, particularly in Germany, could leave the national companies with some residual powers.
Financial Times Service