Report: Koenigsegg Looking to Sell Fewer Saabs at Higher Prices

According to a report in Swedish business daily Dagens Industri (translated by the folks at SaabsUnited), Koenigsegg, the company’s prospective buyer, wants to take the company more up-market while selling fewer vehicles. This would presumably mean higher profit margins, but the proposed plan doesn’t seem to account for the Swedish automaker to turn a profit until at least 2017.

The plan, as laid out in the newspaper, would be set up in three phases. First, is the 2010-11 period where the company plans to sell 115,000 units at an average value of 189.000 SEK ($27,546). For the record, that number is apparently a “before taxes” price, meaning the actual dollar amount would be higher. Currently, the base price for a Saab 9-3 is $30,360 – so we can expect that $27,546 number to be a few thousand over the $30,000-mark. Regardless, the specifics aren’t the important part here, but rather the overall plan behind them.

The next period stretches from 2012-15, where Saab would sell 80,000 cars at 208.000 SEK ($30,311). According to the paper, this phase would include a special 9-5 Koenigsegg Edition. (Probably without an 806-hp twin-supercharged V8 though). The final phase is from 2016 onward and has a planned retail volume of just 65,000 units but at a steeper 280.000 SEK ($40,804) amount. According to the Dagens Industri source, Koenigsegg wouldn’t plan to make a profit at all during this period.

To justify the higher vehicle cost Saab’s will presumably become more luxurious and more high-performance vehicles, although some of the increased MSRP will be the result of pricey electric and hybrid versions.

[Source: Dagens Industri via SaabsUnited]