Old General Motors Auction Off Their Assets

(Detroit News) Assembly lines, robots, grinders and mills were on the auction block this week as Motors Liquidation Co. — the old General Motors — sold off idled equipment at its shuttered Livonia engine plant.

The sale, which drew about 350 and lasted more than 10 hours, is one of several planned for this year and next as the old GM seeks to dispose of “bad assets” left behind when the new General Motors Co. emerged from bankruptcy in 2009.

The auction was at the plant and was webcast to bidders worldwide. The 1-million-square-foot plant once built the Northstar engine line for Cadillac and other high-end models. Only factory equipment was sold at the auction, not property. Another auction is planned for Nov. 4 at GM’s now-closed Pontiac Assembly plant, which used to make full-size pickups. That sale will include basic manufacturing machinery, as well as some factory mementos, such as old Chevrolet signs, said Robert Levy, a partner with Hilco Industrial, LLC, which was hired by the old GM to liquidate factory machinery. Steve Blow, a spokesman for Motors Liquidation Co., declined to comment on how much money was made at the Livonia auction or the specifics of the sale.

Buyers included automotive and aerospace suppliers, as well as resellers buying machinery to repurpose for other types of manufacturing.

“This was a very heavy-duty machinery sale that attracted buyers from all over the world,” including Mexico, Turkey and India, Levy said.

Hilco is working with another auction house, Maynard Industries, to sell machinery and other items at 16 shuttered GM plants, including Livonia and Pontiac. Auctions began in September 2009, and another three are planned before the year’s end, Levy said.

Hilco will also hold auctions at two Old Caraco LLC plants — factories left behind during Chrysler LLC’s bankruptcy — Detroit Axle and the Kenosha Engine Plant in Wisconsin.

In August, the old GM filed a bankruptcy reorganization plan outlining how it will sell off assets, clean up toxic factory sites and resolve creditor claims totaling more than $275 billion.

Among the assets for sale are 50 million square feet of manufacturing space across 14 states, a golf course in New Jersey, an abandoned church in Indiana and thousands of factory robots.

The unwanted plants, however, are the most visible vestiges of the old GM, once the world’s largest automaker.

Money raised by the sales will go into a general fund and then will be split among four trusts as part of the reorganization, Motors Liquidation officials said. The trusts include an $836 million program to clean up 90 former GM sites, as well as a fund for resolving unsecured creditor claims.

The old GM hopes to win bankruptcy court approval early next year for the reorganization plan. The pending court decision won’t affect the machinery sales.

Detroit News