German car magazine Auto Bild and weekly Der Spiegel reported Thursday that General Motors is once again considering the sale of its Opel and Vauxhall units. The reports were dismissed as pure speculation by the Detroit automaker as well as a German state with an Opel factory, which called the news “nonsense”.
According to the news reports, GM allegedly was no longer in need of Opel’s know-how in manufacturing small cars as well as low emission and fuel efficient powerplants and that it could replace the German brand with its South Korean GM Chevrolet unit, formerly known as Daewoo.
The two magazines also speculated that possible buyers for Opel could be Chinese automakers, which in turn could spark the interest of the Volkswagen Group to prevent the brand from falling into the hands of an aspiring rival.
Autonews contacted an Opel spokesperson who denied the rumors saying, ”It is speculation and we don’t comment on speculation,” while a spokesman for the government of Germany’s state of Thuringia, which is home to one of Opel’s factories said: “According to our information that is nonsense”.
Sources: Autonews , De Spiegel & Auto Bild
