It seems that Porsche wants to buy majority interest in Volkswagen, but the workers of Volkswagen are aggressively against the takeover because of their fears concerning Porsche’s future treatment of them.
So, the fight goes on and the inevitable keeps getting postponed. Now comes word, according to the New York Times, that Porsche doesn’t want to be a Scrooge in this story so it is waiting until after the Christmas holidays to finish its takeover of VW.
Evidence shows that Porsche need not be in a hurry. It already owns 31 percent of VW and it also owns another 20 percent stake through shares controlled by the German state of Lower Saxony.
In the meantime, what Porsche already has of VW has been a boon. Porsche fiscal year 2006-2007 figures show earnings of 5.85 billion euros or $8.6 billion in pretax profit, with 3.6 billion euros or $5.3 billion of that came from stock option transactions. The high-end sport car company is doing so well in fact that it is looking for ways to limit its own profits. It has, for example, written off the research and development costs for its new four door sports car, the Panamera (pictured), even though the car is not going to be released until 2009.
Our take? So, will the story of Porsche’s take over of VW be more like Scrooge or Oliver? Or can Porsche turn the workers around into believing that Porsche is Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Once again, this is something that we have to watch play out.