General Motors and Fiat ended threats of legal action on Sunday when the US industrial group agreed to pay €1.55bn to terminate the companies' joint venture agreements and forestall attempts to force it to take over the Italian firm's lossmaking car division.
GM, owners of the Opel and Saab among others, is paying a heavy price to cancel an agreement it signed with Fiat in headier days for both companies five years ago. In 2000 GM took a 20 per cent stake in Fiat Auto, subsequently reduced to 10 per cent, and agreed to a "put" arrangement that gave Fiat the option to sell the rest of its car unit to GM.
However, clearing one large problem means only that both companies now have to roll up their sleeves and tackle far deeper issues.
For Fiat the money is certainly useful, but the group is still bleeding about €1 billion in cash a year, attributable mostly to losses at the car division and debt servicing.
For GM it's another step forward in a methodical process of trying to deal with an array of challenges facing the world's biggest carmaker, from the state of its European operations to the level of its bond rating.
By the Italian company's own reckoning, it will be a long journey before Fiat Auto returns to profitability. Yet even before this week's deal, Fiat was not heading for bankruptcy in the very near future. The most pessimistic of estimates gave it about two years of survival before it ran out of cash. The announcement probably doubles that time.
Sergio Marchionne, Fiat's chief executive, has said that the main benefit of an accord with GM is the freeing up of the Italian group to agree new deals with other car companies.
Fiat's hands have been tied, he believes, while rivals such as Peugeot, Toyota and BMW have been sharing development costs and capacity in a range of successful joint ventures on small cars or on engines.
Marchionne has also been overseeing a change in management and culture at Fiat - and much hopes rest on a number of new models launching in the next three years.
A break-up and job losses at Fiat may still have to take place, but at least it can be at a controlled pace.