I told you so.

When Daimler Benz purchased Chrysler, I said that I would not believe it until I saw a Penastar on a Benz.

I was right!

This "merger" between the 2 companies made no reason to be except one. Greed.

The greed of Chrysler's management and shareholders who wanted to get in on the stock market boom of the 1990's

As, for Daimler Benz's reason for buying Chrysler?

Too much beer during the negotiations?

No matter what the reason however, the Germans took Chrysler and drove it over a brick wall. First by not shearing technology, then by letting Chrysler have MB's old technology while they kept the new stuff for them self.

Finally, like most American and European companies, when the problems got bad, they bailed.

If an Asian company controlled Chrysler, they would look upon Chrysler's current problems and see them as a part of the normal fluctuations in the automotive industries.

In addition, there is another factor in Daimler Benz (I assume that they will return to their old name - a boom at lease for printer and sign painters!) decision to rid themselves of Chrysler.

In the fatherland, Chrysler was looked upon in the same light as the American GI who married into some aristocratic German family. In other words, not good enough for their daughter (Mercedes), and now relieved that a divorce is pending.

Reply to
Geldbraucht
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It was Robert Eaton leading the charge...Iacocca's "biggest mistake of my life."

I think they saw the US as a failing industrial country (true), and the Japs were in line to take over the whole US auto market, so they thought they'd get their slice of the pie before the Chinese got in there. It's typical German arrogance, much like the typical Japanese arrogance that cause them to tank their own economy. Note that both these small but arrogant nations lost a major war against the US...then. They had the bravada...we had the factories and workers. We don't have 'em anymore, that's for sure.

Not the problem. ALL of Benz's "technology" is overengineered by manic kraut engineers whose whole raison d'être is to engineer the crap out of things á la GM's Frigidaire Division in the late '50s through the '70s. DC doomed post-merger products with overcomplicated systems prone to failure that only the Germans could love, similar to what's wrong with all of VW/Audi's product line. Americans are too stupid and lazy to maintain their vehicles well, and thus it was a recipe for reliability disaster. Per CU, ALL new Ford product platforms are now more reliable than anything from DC.

Good allegory. Also, well-off Germans think nothing of spending thousands on car repair and maintenance, whereas US counterparts retch at the thought of an oil change and are too ham fisted to do the job themselves. Chrysler's engineering maxim of "KISS" served them well with the hoary K-car chassis...not a great design and one with much cheapness, but one which would keep running under tons of deferred maintenance and abuse until the thing would finally die. All that went away under DC. I saw how bad things got with DC reliability, and now couldn't be given a DC product.

It's over. With idiots like Quayle and liars like Snow heading up Cerberus (the three headed dog who guards the gates of Hell in Greek mythology, for those with not-so-good educations), it's a "strip 'n flip" operation designed to make the principals of that outfit richer...NOT to build better cars or develop new technology.

Iacocca's got it right in his new book: "Can't anyone around here run a car company?"

Reply to
DeserTBoB

Felt they needed a mainstream maker. BMW tried that too, with Rover, and ended up giving Rover away to a private group for a pound or two. Porsche seems to be trying that now by buying up VW stock.

But look at the reverse too. Ford's purchase of Aston-Martin, Volvo, and Jaguar -- all losing money. GM's purchase of Saab -- losing money. Ford has now sold off most of A-M, and GM has sold off Subaru and most of Isuzu.

No luxury-brand is going to put its current technology in brands costing half as much. Even Toyota has many features exclusive to Lexus.

Perhaps, but that's because Asian investors tend to look at the long haul, whereas American ones look at just the next quarter. Toyota, for example, pays very low dividends, but investors have pushed its stock value up to where it's worth far more than GM.

Like of like Rover vis-a-vis BMW, as I mentioned.

Reply to
Lloyd

As DC said they bought Chrysler to get higher parts volume to lower costs. That worked somewhat but also failed somewhat. DC also said they were going to lift Chrysler prices to produce more profit. That worked somewhat but also failed somewhat.

Unfortunately DC lost many of Chryslers mid sized LH buyers, the 300 didn't interest many of them. Here in Vancouver, BC a long term Chrysler sold his Chrysler dealership because of the LH buyers leaving and low

300 sales. He kept his Toyota dealership. The 300 has sold poorly on the west coast from Oregon to BC.
Reply to
Some O

The main stated reasons at the time were an allegedly complimentary product fit, and access to the state of the art Auburn Hills design facility. At the time of the merger, Mercedes Benz had one of the slowest, most behind-the-curve, antiquated design-to-production cycles of any major car manufacturer on the planet, and it was seriously hurting their ability to compete with companies that had already invested heavily in high-tech engineering design facilities.

Reply to
Steve

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