The Observer reports on the price Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation is prepared to pay for ailing British car maker Rover. The deal sounds a bit like a Silk Alley bargaining session, with the price dropping and dropping every time anyone talks about it. Here is the meat of the deal:

Chinese carmaker Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation is committing itself to pay only a further £130m to seal its proposed deal with MG Rover, according to sources close to negotiations. This is a fraction of the £1 billion that had been expected.

There has already been a £67m down payment, made last autumn, secured against the engine technology and intellectual property on the Rover 25...

...In the autumn MG Rover chairman John Towers said: 'There's a medium car, a small car, a large car and a sports car platform there as well.' Reports suggested that a joint-venture agreement - to be 70 per cent Chinese-owned and 30 per cent Rover - envisaged the investment of £1bn to £1.5bn in the new vehicles...

...The 70/30 JV will be a revenue-sharing agreement. There will be subsidiary joint ventures: one in China, involving SAIC and a third partner Nanjing Automotive, apportioning shares 80/20 between the two, and one in the UK, in which MG Rover and the Chinese will have a stakes.

LINK:
Observer report