General Motors Corp., the largest U.S. automaker facing the threat of bankruptcy, will use the in-court process only if it fails to accomplish a restructuring plan outside the court, Ray Yong, executive vice president and chief financial officer (CFO) of the company, said on Tuesday.
In an exclusive interview with Xinhua at the GM headquarters in the U.S. auto city of Detroit, Yong said: "We have indicated that our preference is to do the restructuring outside the court, at the same time if we can not accomplish our objectives, we would use an in-court process and I know that some of the press have been talking about the concept of a surgical bankruptcy."
"We are going to use this as an opportunity to restructure our companies, to further reduce cost, and also to eliminate or reduce the amount of debt on our balance sheet," he said.
Asked who would suffer most if the company goes bankrupt, he said: "Whether we go bankrupt or not, there will be a lot of sacrifices. For example, we will be reducing the size of our dealer bodies in the country, (and) we will be reducing the amount of employment from both hourly and salary workforce."
He admitted that the talks with the company's bondholders and the United Auto Workers union are going to be very difficult.
Asked about the federal government's role in the GM issue, he said, "the U.S. government has indicated that they believe GM has a very important role to play in the U.S. automobile industry and in the global automobile industry. So on that basis, the U.S. government has indicated that they are prepared to finance us through the restructuring efforts, whether be out-court or in-court."
"For our perspective, we believe that after we accomplish the restructuring plan, the company would come out of the plan as a viable company that would continue to design, build and sell in the United States and around the world. So at this point our focus is to go through the restructuring, work with the U.S. government on restructuring, and then emerge as a stronger company," he noted.
On whether the company plans to sell its brands to some foreign automakers, Yong said that "right now in the U.S., we are undergoing a strategic review of our plans, (and) we have announced that Hummer, Saturn, Saab were going through strategic review."
"We are very open to any automakers around the world who are looking at these brands, looking at these divisions in order to enter into a partnership with GM, or to purchase particular brands," he added.
Source: Xinhua
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