Spyker Cars — the Dutch supercar maker that was hurt by its acquisition of Saab from General Motors – was today declared bankrupt even as owner Victor Muller vowed to revive the company.

A Dutch district court ended a temporary moratorium of payments, equivalent to U.S. Chapter 11 bankruptcy, granted Dec. 2. The court placed Spyker and its wholly owned subsidiaries Spyker Automobielen and Spyker Events and Branding B.V. into receivership.

The court made the decision because the committed bridge funding did not reach the company in time, Spyker said in a statement.

“As far as I am concerned this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning,” Muller said in the statement, quoting British prime minister Winston Churchill’s 1942 speech after the country won a key battle against Germany in the Second World War.

“I will relentlessly endeavor to resurrect Spyker as soon as practically possible and, assuming we will be successful, pursue our goal to merge with a high performance electric aircraft manufacturer and develop revolutionary electric Spykers with disruptive sustainable technology,” Muller said.

Spyker was formed in 2000 to resurrect an early 20th century Dutch auto marque. Last month a Dutch court ordered Spyker to leave its factory in the Netherlands after it fell some  €125,000 ($155,000) into arrears on its rent.

A U.S. court dismissed the company’s $3 billion lawsuit against GM earlier this year. Spyker had accused GM of derailing its plan to sell Saab to a different Chinese buyer from the one that subsequently bought it.

Spyker press release

SPYKER COMPANIES DECLARED BANKRUPT

Zeewolde, the Netherlands, 18 December 2014. Today the District Court of Midden-Nederland, at the request of the administrator, converted the moratorium of payment, granted to Spyker N.V. and its wholly owned subsidiaries Spyker Automobielen B.V. and Spyker Events & Branding B.V. (collectively “Spyker” or the “Company”) on December 2nd, last, to bankruptcy. The cause for this conversion was that the committed bridge funding did unfortunately not reach the company in time. The administrator will continue his work but now as receiver.

Victor R. Muller, Founder and Chief Executive Officer said: “None of the ambitions we had when we founded Spyker 15 years ago, has vanished as a result of today’s events. In 2000 we set out to establish a super sports car business from scratch with a global distribution and we achieved that. Over the years we undertook some daring ventures that left their marks on the company which in turn contributed to today’s demise.

However, I would like to make clear that as far as I am concerned “this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning” to quote Winston Churchill. I will relentlessly endeavour to resurrect Spyker as soon as practically possible and, assuming we will be successful, pursue our goal to merge with a high performance electric aircraft manufacturer and develop revolutionary electric Spykers with disruptive sustainable technology.

This is the moment to express my gratitude to our customers, dealers, suppliers and of course our employees and Board. Their loyalty and support was vital to build the brand over the past decade and a half. They can count on us continuing to live by the Spyker axiom “Nulla Tenaci Invia est Via” (Latin for “For the tenacious no road is impassible”).”