No GM platform for new AAlfa's (yet)

["G.J." <quentemy01@domain.elided>]

From http://www.autonewseurope.com

Jan. 28, 2001
Alfa Romeo is not switching to GM Sigma platform


Luca Ciferri
Automotive News Europe


A rumored switch to a GM rear-wheel-drive platform for the next-generation Alfa
156, 166 and Spider isn't true, says a GM insider.

"We would have loved to have switched the next Alfas to our rear-driven Sigma
platform," said the source. "But such a change would have delayed their US
introduction too long."

He said the next Alfas would be based on the front- and four-wheel-drive
Premium Vehicle Architecture being developing in Sweden by GM, Saab and Fiat.

"Maybe the market should wait for the next product cycle for rear-wheel-drive
Alfas," said the source.

The Alfas are due to go on sale through GM dealers in the USA starting in 2005.

Meanwhile, General Motors does not plan to buy the remaining 80 percent of Fiat
Auto it doesn't already own, says GM CEO Richard Wagoner.

Fiat sold 20 percent of its automotive division to GM in March 2000 and took an
option to sell the remaining 80 percent starting in January 2004.

Asked this month if GM wants to accelerate the timing, Wagoner said: "Those
assertions are not even worth an answer. No one has any intention to change the
agreements we have already signed, nor to accelerate anything. This is not even
a hypothesis."

"After the Fiat Auto reorganization everything goes on as before, with mutual
satisfaction," he said.

Wagoner said GM backs the changes at Fiat.

"Paolo Cantarella informed me in advance of the change. Anyway, our
relationship with Turin remains excellent at every level."

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