General Motors will move to cut costs deeper and faster to meet President Barack Obama's demands for long-term viability to extend government aid, new chief executive Fritz Henderson said on March 31.
Henderson, who took the helm at GM after the government ouster of Rick Wagoner, said the struggling auto giant will use the 60-day deadline announced by Obama to accelerate the restructuring effort.
"The view is we need to do more, we need to do it faster, we understand very clearly what that means," he told a news conference at GM's Detroit, Michigan-based headquarters.
Henderson said GM had made progress but not enough to satisfy Obama's auto task force, which raised the threat of bankruptcy if the company fails to come up with a viable plan to restore profitability.
Developing the plan "doesn't have to take 60 days," he said, adding that GM was prepared to go through bankruptcy court with government help if a better plan cannot be implemented.
"We need to go deeper and we need to go faster," he said. "We'll either get it done out of court or we'll get it done in court but we are going to get the job done."
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2009
