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Kuwait Says To DaimlerChrysler: Sell smart

Everybody has got an opinion about smart these days and since Kuwait owns 7.2 percent of DC it probably felt obligated to say something: ``I don't think they have been successful in reforming the Smart operation so the only solution is to get rid of Smart,'' Bader Mohammad Al-Saad, managing director of the Kuwait Investment Authority.

With everyone is ganging up on the cheeky little brand it must be driving smart staffers nuts. ``Everything has been said,'' sniped Thomas Froehlich, a spokesman, when asked what the company's reaction to its largest shareholder favoring a sale of smart.

Dieter Zetsche has repeatedly stated that smart has until 2007 to turn things around. However with the ever increasing crescendo of "sell smart, sell smart" it must be getting pretty hot in the kitchen. Of course, any potential buyer of smart has to view smart's French assembly plant as a huge liability. The plant could almost be considered a "poison pill" that is preventing the manufacturer's sale.

As a reminder, I'm still predicting that DC will give smart a go in the USA. I would expect an announcement by no later than April and cars heading to our shores no earlier than Fall of 2007.

Bloomberg article is located here.