DETROIT/NEW YORK – Dan Akerson arrives at General Motors Co. as CEO with the same mandate given his predecessor just eight months ago: Bring new leadership to an automaker still struggling with the legacy of its government bailout, Reuters reported.

Akerson, 61, replaces Ed Whitacre as of September in an abrupt shake-up GM announced just a day before it had planned to file for a politically charged stock offering expected to be one of the largest ever.

The suddenness of Whitacre’s departure — coming just a day after a meeting of the top U.S. automaker’s board and announced at an improvised teleconference for reporters and financial analysts — stunned insiders.

GM’s financial advisers, who had spent weeks preparing an IPO filing for U.S. securities regulators, scrambled to rewrite complicated paperwork to take Whitacre out and put Akerson in, one person with direct knowledge of the private process said.

Whitacre, who served as CEO at AT&T and steered it through a series of key mergers, remains GM chairman until the end of the year. He had been expected to quit after guiding GM through an IPO to reduce the U.S. government’s 61 percent ownership stake.

Just a week ago, Whitacre, 68, said he had not given any thought to resigning. “Everybody knows at my age I’m not a real longtimer,” he told reporters.

A lanky Texan who confessed to feeling lost in Detroit and commuted home by plane to San Antonio on weekends, Whitacre had become the face of GM’s turnaround and starred in TV commercials meant to mark its return from bankruptcy.

At GM, Whitacre became famous for spurning the PowerPoint presentations that had become a symbol of the slow decision-making process at the 102-year-old automaker.

After GM’s top executives were blasted for being out of touch and riding to their offices at Detroit’s Renaissance Center on a private elevator, Whitacre took pains to mix with workers, showing up unannounced in offices and factories.

But Whitacre’s hands-off style of delegating also left him appearing sometimes out of touch and at odds with the Obama administration, which wants to see a successful IPO as early as November.

Last week Whitacre said GM was weeks away from an IPO filing, a statement that puzzled staff who were almost finished with the needed work.

Akerson, a quiet and private executive, will face the pressure of becoming the face of GM in an industry where the CEO is often called on to be the biggest salesman.

Like Whitacre, Akerson had a long career in the tightly regulated telecommunications industry. He also has a history of dealmaking as head of buyouts at private equity firm The Carlyle Group.

Akerson became head of global buyouts at Carlyle last July, and was designated by the Treasury Department to serve on the GM board in July 2009 after the automaker emerged from its government-supported bankruptcy.

Analysts said Akerson heads off potential investor concern about executive succession.

A former U.S. Navy officer who served on a destroyer from 1970 to 1975, Akerson supported fellow Navy veteran and Republican John McCain for president.

In 2008, Akerson and his wife donated $80,800 to the Republican Party and its candidates, and nothing to the Democrats or now-President Barack Obama, according to the Center for Responsive Politics in Washington.

The Obama administration has repeatedly said that it chose its representatives on GM’s board, including Akerson, for their qualifications without considering their politics.

Akerson lacks one quality analysts credit with giving Ford Motor Co. CEO Alan Mulally a leg up as an outsider — experience in manufacturing.

Ford hired Mulally away from Boeing Co. in 2006 and as CEO, Mulally has been credited with leading a surprising turnaround of the No. 2 U.S. automaker.

But GM former Vice Chairman Bob Lutz, a legendary “car guy” in Detroit, said that lack of experience won’t stop Akerson.

“Like many strong leaders, he has equally strong opinions,” Lutz said, adding that he would have to listen to the new layer of management Whitacre has put in place. “If he can do that, GM will face a very bright future under his leadership.”

DETROIT – General Motor Co.’s planned initial public offering may be “a tad earlier than people would like,” according to the former head of President Barack Obama’s automotive task force, Bloomberg reported.

It would have been better if GM had more than two profitable quarters in the books, Steven Rattner said in a Bloomberg Television interview. GM reported second-quarter net income today of $1.3 billion on a 44 percent jump in revenue, its second consecutive profit.

Increasing profitability is part of the automaker’s path toward an initial public offering. GM probably will file the registration statement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission tomorrow and possibly by Aug. 16, said a person familiar with the plan who asked not to be named because the discussions are private.

GM, which is 61 percent owned by the U.S. government, emerged from bankruptcy in July 2009 and seeks to raise as much as $16 billion in the offering, which would make it the second-largest, behind Visa Inc.’s $19.7 offering in 2008.

GM also said today Ed Whitacre, who joined the Detroit- based automaker in July 2009, will step down as CEO Sept. 1 and be replaced by director Dan Akerson. Akerson will become chairman when Whitacre steps down from that post at the end of the year.

In tapping longtime telecom executive Daniel Akerson as its next CEO, succeeding Ed Whitacre, GM directors are intent on keeping the automaker on the same, new course a year after it exited bankruptcy, Automotive News reported.

Akerson, an outside director at the automaker since July 2009, will become the fourth CEO at GM in 18 months, and the second consecutive outsider.

And like Whitacre, Akerson, 61, is expected to bring an outsider’s zeal for change and results, with no fear of shaking things up at a company often hidebound by bureaucracy.

“I want turmoil; I want excitement,” he once told Forbes magazine.

The Wall Street Journal says he’s “a blunt-spoken, aggressive competitor.”

He can also be an impatient maverick. Once waylaid by a painful gall bladder ailment in Germany in the early 1990s, he pulled the tubes out of his arm, checked himself out of the hospital and immediately flew to the United States. German doctors were not moving fast enough, he complained to Forbes at the time.

Akerson — an engineering graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy — said today that he did not anticipate major changes in Whitacre’s strategy or approach when he takes over on Sept. 1.

“We share a common vision for the goals and objectives of this company,” Akerson told reporters on a conference call. “There are remarkable opportunities ahead for the new GM, and I am honored to lead the company through this next chapter.”

Under Whitacre, 68, GM’s management ranks and layers have been thinned, with executives holding more authority to speed decision-making. He has made building GM’s core brands a priority to accelerate sales growth and overcome lingering taxpayer concerns about the automaker’s government bailout.

“We still have important work ahead of us,” Akerson said. “But I am confident that we are building the foundation for GM’s long-term success.”

NEW YORK – General Motors Co., the automaker 61 percent owned by the U.S. government, is seeking to raise $12 billion to $16 billion in an initial public offering, a person familiar with the plan told Bloomberg.

The more than 500-page document, called an S-1, is expected to be filed Friday, though it may not happen until Monday, said the person, who asked not to be named because the discussions are private. The exact value of the offering may not be fully detailed in the registration statement filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, said the person.

The IPO would be the second-largest in U.S. history, behind Visa Inc.’s $19.7 billion initial offering in March 2008. The share sale is also the first step in freeing the Detroit-based automaker from government ownership, which CEO Ed Whitacre has pushed for after GM’s $50 billion taxpayer bailout in the wake of its bankruptcy in June 2009.

“After the restructuring, I expect GM to once again be a leading company on the U.S. stock market,” said Kim Yong Tae, who helps manage $2.9 billion equivalent of assets at Yurie Asset Management Co. in Seoul. “The U.S. government has shown a strong will to revive GM. It’s a stock I want to add to my portfolio.”

GM has secured a $5 billion revolving line of credit from a group of at least 15 banks as of Wednesday night New York time, said the person. More than half are named in the draft of the document as underwriters, including Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc., Bank of America Corp. and Credit Suisse Group AG.

Selim Bingol, a GM spokesman, declined to comment on details of the IPO.

“We will do an IPO when conditions are right for the company and in the markets,” he said in an e-mail.

Most of the shares offered would come from the U.S. Treasury, the person said. The aim is to sell a fifth of the government’s 304 million shares, two people familiar with the plan said in June. That would reduce the Treasury’s holdings to less than 50 percent.

The automaker may sell a small number of new shares, the person familiar with the plans said yesterday. The Canadian government, the United Auto Workers union’s retiree medical trust and the estate of the bankrupt predecessor General Motors Corp. haven’t decided whether to participate in the IPO, the person said.

The document will describe the old GM, its restructuring in bankruptcy and liabilities facing the new company, the person said.

GM will report its second quarter profit today, and industry analysts are looking for strong results to set the stage for the IPO even as consumer confidence wanes.

DETROIT – General Motors Co. has secured a $5 billion credit facility in a step that clears the way for a return to the public markets later this year, two people familiar with the deal told The Wall Street Journal.

Banks including Bank of America, Morgan Stanley and J.P. Morgan committed up to $500 million a piece to the credit line, these people said.

A revolving credit facility, which allows a company to borrow for any reason, would bolster GM’s balance sheet and provide a financial cushion should the company’s recovery plans hit a snag.

With the backup funding in place, GM is prepared to file registration papers for an initial public offering as soon as Friday, the people familiar with the matter said.

Ten banks are contributing to the credit facility, but there is a chance more could sign on as demand for the loan was high, a person familiar with the deal said. The facility would likely remain at $5 billion, but the individual amounts could drop, this person said.

Reuters first reported that GM finalized a deal on a credit facility.

The offering is expected later this year and will allow the U.S. government to begin selling its $50 billion stake in the auto maker.

The U.S. Treasury is expected to opt for a sale of at least $10 billion of its shares in the company, but the initial amount remains in question, a person familiar with the situation said.

GM Chairman Edward E. Whitacre is pushing for Treasury to offload as large a stake in the company as possible in an effort to shed the stigma of being owned by the U.S. government. Mr. Whitacre last week told reporters he wanted the government out of the business entirely and is frustrated with the “Government Motors” label critics have placed on GM.

Treasury is taking a more conservative approach to the size of the first sale of shares, looking to avoid diluting the value by putting out too many at once, according to people familiar with the situation.

On Thursday, GM is expected to report a second quarter profit in excess of $1 billon, the company’s strongest performance since at least the second quarter of 2004.

The strong results will be part of GM’s campaign to convince investors it’s a good bet after a bankruptcy that wiped out billions in debt, obligations and excess workers, brands and factories.

For GM, a second consecutive quarterly profit by would mark a turning point for GM, which essentially stopped making money from 2005 through 2009 and has been living off the auto bailout since then.

General Motors Co. said it would replace its chief executive with a board member lacking automotive experience but well-regarded on Wall Street, a move whose timing was surprising and appears designed to pave the way for the car maker’s return to the public stock market, The Wall Street Journal reported.

GM said Daniel Akerson, a 61-year-old director known for his work as a telecommunications dealmaker, will take over as CEO on Sept. 1. He will replace Edward E. Whitacre Jr., a former AT&T Inc. chairman and CEO brought out of retirement by the Obama administration a year ago to lead the company out of its U.S.-financed bankruptcy reorganization.

Whitacre, 68, will remain chairman until December, when he will cede that title to Akerson as well.

The leadership change was announced after GM reported net income of $1.3 billion for the second quarter, on the strength of rising vehicle sales, especially of trucks, and firmer pricing in North America. It follows a profit of $865 million in the first quarter, and is GM’s best showing since 2004′s second quarter.

The change atop the nation’s largest carmaker is part of a plan put in place by GM’s board over the last few weeks to enable the company to present a clear picture of its management team to investors as it looks to return to the public markets and allow the U.S. to cash out its 61 percent ownership stake.

Whitacre has long said he planned to step down after GM offers shares to the public.

“At this stage of my career, it was obvious that I was not going to be at GM for the long haul,” Whitacre said. “This is something the board and I have been contemplating, literally since I joined GM.”

People familiar with the matter said the move was decided by GM’s board without input from the U.S. government, which put more than $50 billion into GM to save the company.

Whitacre’s departure, however, was announced as some tension was building between the company and Washington, people familiar with the matter said. The Obama administration would like GM to hold a stock offering soon, perhaps even before the midterm elections in November, while GM hasn’t committed to such a timetable.

A GM IPO would likely give President Barack Obama grounds to claim that the bailouts of GM and Chrysler Group LLC are working, especially in key election races in the Republican-leaning states where skepticism of the bailout runs high.

The U.S. is expected to sell at least $10 billion of its shares in the company in an IPO, said a person familiar with the situation.

Last week Whitacre publicly expressed a preference for taking more time to prepare for a stock offering, and for having the government sell a major stake in the company so that GM can shed the image of being on government support.

Akerson, who has served as a managing director at the buyout firm Carlyle Group since July 2009, is known as a decisive, hard-nosed and often unforgiving manager—qualities that appealed to members of the Obama administration’s auto task force when they recruited him to join GM’s board last summer. Akerson declined to comment.