Saab chief executive Jan-Ake Jonsson has said investors, including other car manufacturers were in discussions to help save the company.

Jonsson said: “ pure investors to interested parties in the auto industry, but also other carmakers.”

Saab was granted protection from creditors by a Swedish court late last week and the company said then that it had been approached by potential investors, but did not elaborate.

Parent company General Motors set out in its revival plans to the US government that it will end financial support for Saab on January 1, 2010.

Jonsson said Saab's business plans had been revised down substantially in recent weeks and foresaw very low production levels in the near term.

He said: "We revised down our estimated production volume by 10-15%, a little bit depending on what year you are talking about," Jonsson said in the interview which was published on Swedishs newspaper Dagens Industri's website.

Vauxhall

Meanwhile, a supervisory-board member on Opel/Vauxhall, GM’s German subsidiary, has said it need $4.23 billion to help secure its future.

GM has set March 31 for deciding on all its European divisions’ future as the carmaker seeks as much as $16.6 billion in new U.S. federal loans.

GM has already said its Luton-based Vauxhall is “integral to operations”.

A person familiar with the situation told Bloomberg that Opel’s plants in Bochum and Eisenach, Germany, faced the greatest threat, together with another in Antwerp, Belgium.