Released on June 1, 2009

General Motors Corp. (GM), Detroit, has reached agreements with the U.S. Treasury and the governments of Canada and Ontario to create a “new GM,” a company that will close Massena Castings, Massena, N.Y., but maintain its Saginaw Metal Casting Operations, Saginaw, Mich.

According to a press release issued by GM, the new company is intended to be leaner, operating only the most profitable plants and producing the most popular brands, and maintain a stronger balance sheet, with decreased debt and operating costs. The new GM will incorporate the terms of the company’s recent agreements with the United Auto Workers and Canadian Auto Workers unions and will be led by GM’s current management team.

According to a letter to GM leaders from the company’s President and CEO Fritz Henderson, in addition to the Massena plant, the company will close its Pontiac and Wilmington assembly plants, the Grand Rapids, Indianapolis and Mansfield Metal stamping plants, and the Livonia Engine, Flint North Components, Willow Run, Parma Components and Fredericksburg Components plants. GM’s Orion and Spring Hill assembly plants will be placed on “standby capacity” status, as will the Pontiac Metal stamping plant. The company’s Janesville Assembly plant’s status was changed from closed to standby, and the Boston, Jacksonville and Columbus SPO facilities are set to close by Dec. 31.

Under the current plan, GM and three domestic subsidiaries have filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy to facilitate the sale of the company’s assets to the new GM. GM will use its cash-on-hand and debtor-in-possession financing of approximately $33 billion to continue to do business prior to the closing of the sale. The company said its employees will become part of the new GM.

“Today marks a defining moment in the reinvention of GM as a leaner, more customer-focused, and more cost-competitive company that, above all, can quickly generate winning bottom line results,” Henderson said. “The economic crisis has caused enormous disruption in the auto industry, but with it has come the opportunity for us to reinvent our business. We are going to do it once and do it right.”