Liam Dann: Biggest share float huge coup for GM's cool-headed Kiwi

High-flying Kiwi executive Chris Liddell has just knocked off the biggest public share float in history.

As chief financial officer at US car maker General Motors, he and his team have played a key role in organising the offer which raised a record US$23 billion - taking it past the US$22 billion raised in August by Agricultural Bank of China.

The success of the float is big news in the United States where it is being hailed as a rebirth for the struggling car industry and a huge shot in the arm for Wall Street.

President Barack Obama celebrated the prospect of the US public breaking even on the US$50 billion bailout it had given the ailing car company last year.

"Today, one of the toughest tales of the recession took another big step towards becoming a success story," the President declared at a press conference called to laud the float.

So how is the Mt Albert Grammar old boy taking it all? In his stride, of course.

On the phone from GM's Detroit head office, Liddell sounds decidedly laid back - the way Kiwis always do, whether they've just climbed the world's highest mountain or won an Oscar for making a Hollywood blockbuster.

"Yeah, no, I was in New York this morning for the ringing of the bell [at the stock exchange] and I just got back to Detroit for an employee function this evening, so there's a lot going on," Liddell says.

Of course it could be he is just exhausted.

Liddell has been with GM since January and has worked solidly on the float since he arrived.

His boss, chief executive Dan Akerson, has been with the company just three months.

So Liddell has played a key role in putting it all to together. He says it was a huge effort on the part of finance team which has 2000 employees worldwide.

And in the past three weeks the push has been on to sell the stock.

"So we had two teams on the road for two weeks doing something like 85 presentations and meetings. To put it in context, it's looking like it will be the biggest IPO of all time, so in order to achieve you need a broad base of investors."

As of yesterday the company appeared to have weighted the float just right. The shares rose almost 4 per cent on market debut.

"It really couldn't have worked out better, so far," Liddell says.

Certainly it's a blast of good news for a once-great US company that was bankrupt as recently as July last year.

For those not following every twist and turn of the story, GM's transformation does seem dramatic. Liddell is reluctant to take the credit for that. "Certainly a huge amount has been done in the past year but some of the foundations for success were set well before that," he said.

"The single biggest thing that has been done in the past few years has been improving the quality of the vehicles.

"You can do all you like to the balance sheet and the cost structure but unless you actually produce cars and trucks that people want to buy then it is all for nought."

Nevertheless this result is not going to hurt Liddell's reputation as a super CFO. His last job as chief financial officer of Microsoft saw him credited with fixing the financial structure of that otherwise hugely successful company.

"Microsoft is a great company but GM is even more deeply entrenched in the US culture, having been around for more than 100 years," he said. "Certainly working with people here you get an extraordinary sense of mission. They believe in what we're doing. It resonates through the hallways."

The success of the float has been enormously significant in the US as it struggles with tough economic times.

"It's way too early to declare victory but it's a milestone and a symbolic one for Detroit."

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