A simple plan for Detroit

2008-12-12 09:19 UTC

Let me start with two disclaimers. I know nothing about making cars. And I feel terribly sorry for everyone who is about to lose their job at General Motors and Chrysler.

Instead of investing 15 billion dollars in paying off debts, making cars that don’t sell too well, and keeping last century dealerships open and paying salaries to managers and marketers, I propose the following:

• Keep the factory buildings open: do not turn off the light and heating but instead allow former factory workers to enter the buildings. Keep some security staff around to keep things orderly.

• Enable small groups of up to 50 people to use the machines, tools and assembly lines to setup workshops where they can design and build products invented by themselves. I’m thinking about cheap windmills, solar panels, bicycles, water pumps, heck maybe even electric cars. Everyone who joins such a startup automatically becomes shareholder of a future corporation if the group succeeds with their venture.

• These groups might consist of engineers, craftsmen and women, and some supporting roles for IT and administration. Everybody does sales: no need for marketers or sales people. Former administrative assistents role up their sleeves and do paint jobs. The catering lady designs a logo. And a senior assembly line worker finally seizes the opportunity to learn how to program the order picking robot.

• These small groups can apply for funding if they have a good plan or product. Funding can be obtained from state or federal funds, universities, VCs or private investors. The 50 person limit prevents funding becoming too large or risky.

• Other groups of people, who don’t have their own ideas, can apply for contracts in other industries or universities to ‘build stuff’. Detroit must have an amazing number of craftsmen and women who are experts in electrical engineering, metal processing, wielding, laser cutting et cetera. In the past e.g. MIT would never have considered outsourcing the production of experimental solar panels to Chrysler. But a band of 50 people in a skunkworks outfit is a perfect match.

• Universities can setup small freshmen boot camps in the corner of a factory building to crank up the knowledge of people who see the current events as a (forced) opportunity to change course.

• Everyone who joins one of these small startups is entitled to a modest salary. I’m pretty sure the costs of paying for food, clothing and shelter are much lower than the proposed, but failed, 15 billion.

I realize there are countless issues to be dealt with such as the selling of tools and factory buildings, but the infrastructure of the car makers is so incredibly big that I’m pretty sure it can accomodate 20 to 30 of those 50-people startups. And yes, this means only ~1500 people find a new job, but just wait a couple of years and some of these ventures will need new people to support their growth.

Andy Warhol said “They always say time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.”

4 comments