The Penske File

Roger Penske's auto parts company looks to a be a big winner in the shakeup affecting the American automotive industry. Penske's namesake transportation services company, which already sells Daimler's Smart car in the United States, has acquired GM's Saturn brand.

Why is this good? Well, it will keep Saturn dealers in business and save jobs. And, despite the brand's loss of direction in this past decade, it continues to have a good reputation for quality service and no-haggling deals. Penske will continue to sell GM-made cars for a couple of years - sorry, no Astras - and after 2011, the firm will sell cars from other manufacturers.

The sad irony is that Saturn started out as an effort by GM to win buyers back from imports, and it succeeded at first. But as subsequent product became more generic and efforts at carving out a new image for the division failed, the General has had to give up on the venture and concentrate on its more mainstream brands. Penske will have to find another source for Saturn vehicles, and there's no other domestic manufacturing base he can turn to, unless he wants to sell Fiskers or Texas-made DeLoreans. What's left? You got it.

Saturns for the 2012 model year might come from Renault or possibly even from a Chinese company.

Meanwhile. . . . After years of a huge German and Japanese presence in the U.S. automobile market, the pending sale of Chrysler's assets to Fiat of Italy seemed to complete the domination of the American highway by the old members of the Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis. Not so fast. Chrysler's stiffed bondholders, whose intransigence put the automaker in bankruptcy in the first place, petitioned the Supreme Court to block the sale approved by a New York bankruptcy judge, and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg - who must have had a bad experience with a Dodge - temporarily delayed the sale pending a review by her and her colleagues. If the delay goes on long enough, the Fiat-Chrysler deal could be scuttled and the company liquidated. Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne, Il Duce, would not be pleased.

And if that happens, how would Marchionne get Fiat back into the U.S. market?

Hmm, maybe he should call Roger Penske . . .