Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne said on Tuesday that he was confident the Turin automaker and Detroit Number Three Chrysler would be able to forge their alliance.
Speaking at the 79th Geneva International Motor Show, Marchionne said he would be in the United States this week for talks with American officials ''to understand at what point the situation is''.
''It has always been our full intention to reassure the US government that loans given to Chrysler will stay with Chrysler,'' Marchionne explained.
''We have no intention of going to America to take their taxpayers money to help Fiat in Italy. What we want to do is to create something which has value in the medium-long term,'' he added.
The American automaker is currently seeking a $5 billion government loan and has made its proposed alliance with Fiat a keystone of its recovery plan.
The loan is also considered pivotal for the Fiat-Chrysler alliance which is designed to help the American automaker develop fuel efficient cars and give the Italians a springboard to bring the Alfa Romeo marque and new Fiat 500 city car to the American market.
In regard to the loan, Marchionne said it was up to Chrysler ''to come up with a solution to move forward. In our talks with US officials we will explain Fiat's position and what we intend to do''.
Although Fiat is not getting any loans from the Italian government, it will benefit from new incentives to trade in older, less fuel efficient cars for new, low-emission ones.
According to Marchionne, the Italian incentives ''are a structurally necessary measure to renew the national fleet of vehicles and it is my hope they will become permanent''.
The Fiat CEO criticised France for exclusively helping French automakers and spoke out against the hypothesis of the German government buying into Opel because both actions distorted competition on the market.
''Aid has to be made available to everyone or it should go to no one. The field is not level when one producer can count on three billion euros in aid while Fiat has to do everything on its own,'' Marchionne said.
''Fiat is doing what it has to do without asking anyone for anything and is financing itself in an extremely difficult period. I hope the situation does not arise where everyone else has state aid and we don't,'' he added.
Turning his attention to Fiat's strategy of forging alliances with other automakers, Marchionne explained that ''we are talking to everyone because this is the moment to develop alliances. As I have said before, in the not-too-distant future our industry will have five or six producers with a minimum market of five million cars''.
Aside from Chrysler, Fiat is also currently engaged in talks with Germany's BMW to develop common platforms and components for Alfa Romeo and Mini models.
