Saab’s new manager, National Electric Vehicle Sweden (NEVS), has produced two Saab 9-3.1 test vehicles in the brand’s Trollhattan construction plant in Sweden in advance of a production unveiling later on in 2013
The cars, which eventually left the assembly line on Wednesday, are the very first Saabs to get constructed in the plant considering that it closed down in April 2011 before the automaker declaring bankruptcy 8 months later on.
NEVS say the vehicles are mainly meant to help with calibrating manufacturing line systems and also to check new components prior to complete manufacturing.
“Prior to our final decision to begin manufacture of Saab vehicles, we have to finalize several remaining dialogues to construct relationships with suppliers. Now that we know the plant is prepared for manufacturing,” Mattias Bergman, the acting president of NEVS, stated on Wednesday.
NEVS intends to begin production of the Saab 9-3.1 driven by a petrol turbocharged power plant later on this year. The product will be quite a lot like the very last Saab manufactured in 2011, Mikael Oestlund, a spokesperson for NEVS, informed Automotive News Europe.
An electrical version planned for manufacturing in 2014 will include new face-lifted bodywork Oestlund stated.
Long term Saab vehicles won’t have the distinctive griffin head logo found on earlier Saabs following NEVS unsuccessful attempt to get the legal rights to make use of the badge when it acquired Saab out from bankruptcy last August.
Previous owner Spyker, which purchased Saab from General Motors, didn’t restore the brand name after attempting without success to set up a number of deals with Chinese shareholders.
NEVS has stated in the past it also intends to construct vehicles using the Phoenix architecture created by Saab prior to the car maker went on the rocks. The platform will need to be altered to eliminate the 20 % of components acquired from GM.
The business intends to construct 120,000 units of the Saab 9-3.1 annually by 2016, as outlined by a written report by Bloomberg in January. That goal will come near to the brand’s 2006 maximum of 133,000 vehicles.
NEVS states the Saab 9-3.1 is going to be available in European countries and China at first with U.S. sales probable later on.