General Motors officials are planning to announce the launch of “the new GM” today (Friday), after the automaker was cleared to emerge from bankruptcy. A judge on Sunday night approved the sale of the company's assets to a new corporation owned largely by the United States, Canada and the United Auto Workers retiree health fund, but the order did not go into effect until today (Friday). The court-approved sale, expected to be completed by today's announcement, will culminate a landmark government bailout. Some critics, including some of GM's creditors, have said the company should simply have been allowed to fail. But US Bankruptcy Judge Robert E. Gerber wrote in a July 7 ruling that a liquidation of the company “would be a disastrous result for GM's creditors, its employees, the suppliers who depend on GM for their own existence, and the communities in which GM operates.” A US District Court judge on Thursday denied a request by a committee of asbestos personal injury claimants to delay the sale of General Motors Corp pending its appeal. Judge Lewis Kaplan said in court documents that the stay of the sale would likely lead to the liquidation of GM, which is trying to sell its best assets into a “New GM” funded by the government ahead of a July 10 financing deadline. US Bankruptcy Court had already denied a request to fast- track the appeal and said the sale could go forward afternoon Thursday. GM was pushing ahead with final work on the assets sale to a new company funded by the US Treasury and could close that deal by Friday, people involved in the process said. That would complete GM's bankruptcy process in just over a month - a faster timetable than even the aggressive target set by the Obama administration. GM had no immediate comment on the developments. The GM sale may face other appeals as well. Plaintiffs in a death liability case being heard in Arizona said in bankruptcy court documents that they plan to file an appeal of the sale of General Motors Corp's assets in district court.
