A new global marketing strategy for Saab will be rolled out with the help of UK dealers. “Britain has our best dealer network but even there we have more work to do,” said Peter Augustsson, the new president of Saab, at the Paris motor show.

There had not been enough focus on product development in the early 1990s, and Saab had suffered because of this, he said. With volumes running at only 70-80,000 a year it was difficult to sustain new development.

Now that the right product was beginning to come through and volumes were up to 125,000 a year, Saab could concentrate on a new marketing strategy.

“We have the potential to build and sell 150,000 cars a year worldwide. A new V6 diesel for the 9-5 will help, especially in France, but Germany is a big problem –it's just not working for us,” said Mr Augustsson.

His priorities were to “improve the service experience for our customers”; improve the marketing and distribution and improve communications with dealers.

“We will be launching seven new cars over the next four to five years,” he said.