No, no it shouldn’t.
Companies who wish to succeed, must cater for what the public wants.
The public for all their sins did not want elegant saloons or 10yr old designs badge engineered tart ups, nor did they want nods to the past or a tip of the cap.
They wanted exciting sports cars, something that elevated them above their peers into some faux sense of social hierarchy.
As a company that was sinking for years it should have been massively scaled back in size and had every process streamlined for efficiency to focus on a smaller range of new models. I think that would have put them in a better standing for a buyout later down the line, but ultimately it was too late in the day to turn it around without huge financial pumping.
BMW knew this and the Government knew this...nobody wanted to prop it up and have that burden looming, politically nobody wanted to be responsible for haemorrhaging tax payers money on it.
Phoenix was the best short term solution, even though I’m sure they knew it would fail. It satisfied the Germans, came with a big cheque and secured short term jobs which is great for the moral of voters
They knew that by the time it went belly up it would be someone else’s job to clean up the mess.
The company didn’t produce cars with enough kerb appeal, desirability or credibility to compete in such a fierce market. Car buyers spoke with their money and went elsewhere. That’s not the fault of the government.
Poor management and a culture of harking back to the glory years gone is not how you progress. They were stuck in their ways and were punished for it.