What do Britney Spears, Mario Lopez, and FCA have in common?

Page Six of the auto industry

Cold feet

Carlos Ghosn said that mergers are like marriages and the merger between FCA and Renault couldn’t have been shorter. One day they were all lovie dovie and the next day they pulled a Britney Spears and Jason Alexander, getting divorced after the euphoria of 55 hours of wedded bliss wore off.
The FCA and Renault merger didn’t get to the marriage stage, but after about 55 hours of being engaged, why did they call it quits? Why didn’t they at least get married before it fell apart like most other mergers in the history of the automobile business?

What happened at the Bachelor party?

Was there a nefarious reason? Was Renault already cheating on FCA with that cute little Nissan behind its back? Conspiring to get rid of Dodge and Chrysler to allow Nissan to have more market share in the United States? Renault owns 43% of Nissan, with voting rights. If they took over FCA and dumped Dodge and Chrysler, Nissan could pick up those sales. Or better yet, Renault could find its way back into the USA market.

That would be more like an Ali Landry and Mario Lopez, where Ali found out that Mr. Extra Extra was entertained a little too much at his bachelor party. The marriage was deemed a lemon after realizing she didn’t have 100% of his vested market share.

Anything for a party?

Probably the one failed merger/marriage most like the FCA/Renault/Nissan merger would be Robin Givens and Svetozar Marinkovic. The former Mrs. Mike Tyson was married to and divorced from Marinkovic the same day. Now that my friends is efficiency. No muss no fuss.

A day or so after the gleefulness, and party, the Board of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V. sent out a press release, “FCA remains firmly convinced of the compelling, transformational rationale of a proposal that has been widely appreciated since it was submitted, the structure and terms of which were carefully balanced to deliver substantial benefits to all parties. However, it has become clear that the political conditions in France do not currently exist for such a combination to proceed successfully.”

If only there were a murder, it could have been a movie. As it stands it is a sitcom without a renewal for another season.