The first Saab 9-4X crossovers rolled into U.S. dealer showrooms this week.

With cash in hand to pay both workers and boycotting suppliers, Saab will re-start its Swedish assembly line on August 9^th, the automaker confirmed, though company officials acknowledge Saab still has a tough battle ahead if it hopes to reverse the financial problems that nearly shut it down over the last three months of frantic deal making.

While the maker continues to look for additional revenue sources to help ensure it won’t run into another cash crunch, the upcoming challenge will be to not only resume production but get buyers back into the carmaker’s 199 U.S. showrooms, said Tim Colbeck, President and Chief Operating Officer of Saab Cars North America.

“Our priority,” he said, during a small briefing for Detroit journalists, “is to instill confidence in the brand.”

There hasn’t been much of that in recent months.

Saab’s crisis began even before the company was sold off by General Motors in early 2010.  Before the deal was complete, GM decided to shutter the Swedish company’s home assembly plant, and the new Amsterdam-based owners needed seven weeks to get the Trollhattan plant up and running again.  When sales fell short of expectations – reaching only 5,000 in the U.S. last year – Saab ran out of cash and couldn’t pay suppliers, touching off a boycott that began in late March.

By late last month, the maker was so broke it couldn’t pay Swedish workers, but it has been frantically lining up a series of deals that helped replenish its coffers – albeit at a steep price.  It expects to sell a majority 53.9% stake to two Chinese companies: Pang Da, that country’s largest automotive retailer, and Zhejiang Youngman Lotus Automobile, a rising manufacturer which already has ties with several European vehicle makers, including Britain’s Lotus.

Meanwhile, Saab has sold its plant and other properties in a complex leaseback deal, while also lining up a six-month bridge loan that helped it pay off workers and suppliers.

While it will likely be September before the Chinese ventures win formal approval, “The door is open” for other possible deals, said Colbeck, who joined the maker three months ago after a 25-year career with Subaru of America.  One of the most likely new deals would bring in Vladimir Antonov, a Russian banking oligarch and a former partner of Saab’s global CEO Victor Muller.

High finance might be the way to keep the bills paid but Saab’s future requires good product and creative marketing, stressed Colbeck and his new second-in-command, former Chrysler executive David Rooney, now the executive director of marketing for Saab.

For years, Saab’s image as the producer of distinctive – if quirky – products was steadily whittled away, GM holding down costs by doing little more than rebadging more mainstream products from Chevrolet and its other brands.

The new 9-5 and 9-4X models have begun to instill a bit more “saab-ness,” as Rooney suggested.  Nonetheless, the executives admit the sedan model got off to a bad start, last year, due to a series of mistakes.  For one thing, Saab started out by bringing over only the highest-priced version of the 9-5.

With the 9-4X, the brand’s first crossover, just rolling into showrooms this week, Saab hopes to learn from its mistakes.  There’ll be a broader mix, including base cars starting at $33,380.  The maker is also building in more content than it might have in years past.

Meanwhile, when the Trollhattan plant resumes production in August it will shift immediately to the 2012 revision of the Saab 9-5, which should address some issues, including price – with the maker adding $1,700 in new content – and design, thanks to a “fix” for the instrument panel, the most frequently criticized feature on the sedan.

Saab will also introduce a few new products for 2012, notably including a wagon, or SportCombi version of the 9-5.

The really significant new products will start rolling out in 2013 when the maker introduces a new compact model which Colbeck confirms will be “similar in size” to the aging 9-3, though Saab may not market it as a replacement for the old model.  Indeed, the maker is giving hints it just might abandon the current vehicle nomenclature.

Earlier this week, Chairman Muller revealed plans to produce a downsized model, tentatively dubbed 9-1, as well as bigger 9-6 and 9-7 models (which industry observers expect to designate a full-sized luxury sedan and crossover).  But those are “working names,” cautioned Colbeck, that could be changed before launch.

The 9-1 would potentially play well in Europe and other markets where even luxury buyers are downsizing.  The bigger models, the executive added, “are primarily focused on the Chinese market, though they have potential applications in the U.S.”

Product development will be the responsibility of both Youngman and Saab, though Colbeck confirmed that the Swedish maker might still seek help in developing underlying vehicle platforms from another manufacturer.  It already has formed an alliance with BMW that could provide the powertrains for future models large and small.

The key will be to come up with vehicles that deliver the sort of sporty, driver-focused experience Saab owners expect, Colbeck stressed, suggesting, “Saab is a passion brand.  Our job is to make more people passionate about it.”

In today’s crowded market it won’t be easy, and the turnaround won’t come quickly, but Saab is betting it can do a lot better than it did last year in the critical U.S. market.  This year’s volumes will depend on how quickly the Trollhattan plant gets up and running again.  But the goal is to get sales up to at least 30,000 – well short of the 48,000 peak set in in 2006.  Worldwide, Muller has said that Saab could break even on annual sales of around 80,000.

“I hope the worst is over,” said George Peterson, chief automotive analyst with AutoPacific, Inc., adding his belief that, “If they can get through the summer …and begin generating cash flow…they could have a chance.”

But “the real challenge,” the analyst cautioned, will be to convince buyers that Saab really is a viable company.  Until that message gets across, potential customers will steer clear of its showrooms no matter how good the product or creative the company’s marketing.  Motorists want to be sure that when they plunk down that big an investment there’ll be somebody standing behind them.