Saleen-ASC Combine Motor City Grit, California Glamour
By Joseph Szczesny
TROY, Michigan -- Behind the introduction of the Saleen S5S Raptor at the New York International Auto Show in March is the story of a corporate reorganization that blends two companies previously struggling on their own.
The new Saleen Inc. combines Motor City grit of the former ASC and the California glamour of the former Saleen operations in finely calibrated balance, said Paul Wilbur, CEO of the new Saleen.
Wilbur told AutoObserver that the Raptor is the first project in which both sides of the house have contributed. It combined the efforts of Saleen engineering and ASC's creative team, which usually labors in anonymity for big clients such as General Motors.
(Read more...)
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Shipping Shortage Wearing on Automakers
By Bill Visnic
and Michelle Krebs
If an eroding U.S. economy and commensurately sliding auto sales aren't enough to worry about, several global automakers can add a new worry for 2008: a vexing lack of ships to carry vehicles from port to port and skyrocketing increases in the cost of shipping vehicles.
A General Motors executive called the issue "a matter of global strategic importance," warranting attention from the highest levels at the automaker, and a major issue facing all manufacturers.
(Read more...)
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Chrysler Picks Small Car Over Chrysler Crossover
Chrysler will focus on designing a small car to be manufactured by Nissan and forgo plans
to build a Chrysler version of the Dodge Journey.
Chrysler had planned for the Chrysler crossover in 2009 but will use the savings to help pay for designing a compact car to be made by Nissan, Chrysler's James Press said Monday.
The cancellation of the Chrysler Journey shows Press is advancing his plan to reduce the number of models Chrysler brands sell, and eliminate overlap between the divisions.
It is also an illustration of how Chrysler is cash-strapped.
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Hewlett-Packard Buying EDS, Once GM Owned
Wall Street is abuzz with the news that Hewlett-Packard is buying Electronic Data Systems for $12.6 billion.
Old-timers in the auto industry may remember that General Motors, with the late and controversial Roger Smith at the helm, purchased EDS, founded by H. Ross Perot, in 1984 for $2.6 billion. GM's purchase of EDS along with Hughes Aircraft and a host of small high-tech companies was part of Smith's vision to
It didn't work out that way. Perot, who served on the GM board, complained all too publicly of how hidebound and slow to act GM was, prompting GM to buy out Perot, who went on to form another company and run for U.S. president, and spin off EDS. GM remains one of EDS's largest customers; EDS employees occupy two towers of downtown Detroit's Renaissance Center, purchased last week by GM and used as its corporate headquarters.
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'Big Auto' Lobbying Fares No Better in CA Than in D.C.
By Bill Visnic
Senior representatives from several major automakers comprising the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers met in California yesterday with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, hoping to twist the strong-guy governor's arm about the state's ongoing and uncomfortable pressure on the federal government to allow California to set its own carbon-dioxide emissions standards.
California's proposed standards would require better fuel economy improvements, on a quicker time line, than the new Corporate Average Fuel Economy mandate approved by Congress earlier this year -- and which the auto industry largely resisted. Most automakers would rather not -- to put it mildly -- see California permitted to adopt an even more rigid regulation, so they loaded up the lobbying plane in hopes of doing better in California than they've done in Washington, D.C.
Schwarzenegger, however, appears to have resolutely rebuffed the Alliance and its representatives.
(Read more...)
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Audi, VW Considering Options for U.S. Plant
Audi Chief Executive Rupert Stadler confirmed that Audi is in talks with its parent Volkswagen AG to build an assembly plant in North America.
The dollar, which has traded at record lows against the euro throughout the past year, has made it costly for German automakers like Audi and Volkswagen to import cars to the U.S. Stadler told shareholders at the company’s annual meeting that he sees no let up in the currency situation.
Plus Audi plans to increase its global sales to more than 1 million vehicles this year, but is not growing as fast as it wants to in the U.S. “The growth that we have seen throughout the world has not translated into growth on the U.S. market to the extent that we would like,” Stadler told shareholders at Audi’s annual meeting. “We stand to benefit tremendously from having our own local production.''
(Read more...)
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Daimler To Open Office in Iraq
Daimler AG, after a 20-year absence, plans to open an office in Baghdad by year-end, a display of confidence that Iraq is stabilizing.
A Daimler spokesperson told various media outlets Tuesday that the office is intended to establish the German auto and truck maker’s corporate presence in Iraq more than generate immediate sales.
(Read more...)
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Chery Partners With Arizona Chipmaker for Hybrids, Fuel Technologies
Chinese automaker Chery Automobile Co. Ltd. is partnering with a Phoenix, Arizona-based high-tech company, Freescale Semiconductor, to build a research facility in China to develop hybrids and other fuel-efficiency technologies.
"Through joint research and development, Freescale and Chery intend to drive breakthroughs in next-generation automotive system designs," Paul Grimme, Freescale senior vice president, told the Arizona Republic.
Chery also has an affiliation with Chrysler that is moving forward. Freescale supplies, among other things, advanced automotive chips for the 2008 Chevrolet Tahoe and GMC Yukon 2-Mode hybrids. Chrysler is about to launch the same 2-Mode technology, cooperatively developed by General Motors, Daimler and Chrysler with BMW, in its 2009 Chrysler Aspen and Dodge Durango.
(Read more...)
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Nissan Reveals Light-Commercial Direction at Next Detroit Auto Show
By Bill Visnic
CASCAIS, Portugal – Nissan Motor Co. Ltd., eager to enter North America’s rapidly transforming light-commercial vehicle (LCV) market, will signal type of vehicles it intends to offer with an unveiling at the Detroit auto show in January, said William J. Krueger, Nissan North America Inc.’s senior vice president-manufacturing, purchasing and supply chain management for The Americas.
Nissan announced in early April it will produce and sell three LCVs for North America beginning in the first half of 2010. The plan accomplishes two Nissan goals: adds the U.S. to its markets for its commercial vehicles and fills up its Canton, Miss., plant.
(Read more...)
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MAZDA6 for America Arrives
By Peter Nunn
TOKYO -- When it didn’t turn up at the New York auto show back in March, some began to wonder when Mazda would finally get around to unveiling the long awaited, unique-to-the-U.S. 2009 Mazda6 sports sedan.
The answer came last week, in time for Mazda’s conference in Japan to announce its 2007-08 business year results.
As Mazda executives sat down to give details of another year’s turbocharged performance from the self-styled Zoom Zoom company (net profit up 25 percent to a record $916 million on a best-ever turnover of $3.5 billion, with global vehicle sales up nearly 5 percent to 1.36 million units), this new American Mazda6 sedan was the icing on the cake.
(Read more...)
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April Car Sales: U.S. Consumers Flock to Cars, Gouging Detroit Three
By Dale Buss
Americans rushed to swap their thirsty trucks and SUVs for fuel-efficient cars in April, making the month a turning point for the industry’s biggest segment shift in memory.
The stampede to cars left in the dust a Detroit Three that simply weren’t ready for its magnitude because of their reliance on truck-based vehicles, while it lifted Japanese automakers whose traditional strength has remained in small cars.
As U.S. consumers definitively reacted to $3.50-a-gallon gasoline, passenger cars outsold truck-based vehicles for the first time in at least 20 years. The move comprised a shift of six percentage points for the industry compared with last April, to 54 percent car sales.
(Read more...)
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Chevrolet Malibu, Ford Fusion, Pontiac G6 Gain Traction in Crucial ‘C’ Segment
By Dale Buss
Chevrolet Malibu is helping put Detroit back on the map in the mid-size sedan segment. Even the three-year-old Pontiac G6 and Ford Fusion are helping out on that front as well.
Of course, the real Big Three of the so-called “C” segment of the market remain solidly entrenched atop it: Honda Accord, Toyota Camry and Nissan Altima. Accord was the nation’s hottest-selling vehicle during the first quarter, according to Edmunds.com data, overcoming a sluggish start since the new model’s debut last fall to move 88,000 units from January through March. Camry, at 84,000 units, and Altima, with 76,000 sales, were right behind.
But domestic automakers nevertheless are encouraged by recent glimmers of hope in a crucial segment in which they haven’t been competitive for several years -- even though mid-size sedans used to be the Big Three’s bread and butter. At least the progress lately is a place to start.
(Read more...)
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Rick Suzuki: Fall on Sword Justified?
By Michelle Krebs
It was puzzling and surprising when Rick Suzuki announced in late March that he would
step down as chairman of American Suzuki due to the company’s poor performance.
After all, American Suzuki sales haven’t appeared that bad on the surface. In fact, Suzuki sales have nearly doubled since 2003. In March this year, Suzuki sold 10,510 vehicles, its highest amount since June 2007 in an extremely tough sales environment when the industry as a whole and most automakers reported a sales decline.
But a closer look by Edmunds.com shows those sales came at a cost that led to the operating losses to which Rick Suzuki referred in his March letter to employees.
(Read more...)
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Ford’s Early Agreement with Canadian Union a Positive Sign
By Michelle Krebs
The news that Ford reached an early agreement with its Canadian union is being overshadowed by Las Vegas billionaire Kirk Kerkorian's purchase of the automaker’s stock, but the Canadian deal is every bit as significant -- maybe even more so.
Talks between Detroit’s three automakers and the Canadian Auto Workers union regarding a new contract to replace the current ones that expire in September appeared as if they could be extremely rancorous. A strike appeared to be a distinct possibility.
But Ford’s announcement Monday that it had reached an agreement with the Canadian union -- especially in an unheard of four months plus ahead of schedule decreases -- lessens the odds.
(Read more...)
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Honda Accord Is the Best-Selling VEHICLE in March; Will a Car Win the Top Spot Again in April?
By Michelle Krebs
Will a car instead of a truck be America's best-selling vehicle again in April?
In March, the Honda Accord was not only the best-selling car in America it was also the best-selling vehicle. A car has ranked as the best-selling vehicle in monthly sales only five times in the last six years, according to Edmunds.com's analysis. Four of those times, the Accord was tops; the Toyota Corolla ranked No. 1 once, in May 2007.
But with pickup truck sales plummeting and consumers turning to more fuel-efficient cars, a car could take the top spot again for April when automakers post sales reports on Thursday.
(Read more...)
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April Auto Sales: Buyers Continue Shift to Smaller Cars and SUVs
SANTA MONICA, Calif. – As gas prices skyrocket, the biggest growth in April vehicle sales
are expected to be in small cars and small SUVS. In total, April vehicle sales likely will show a decline from April of last year but increase from this past March, according to a forecast by Edmunds.com.
Automakers are expected to report new vehicles sales, including fleet sales, of 1.3 million units for April, a 2.2 percent decrease from April 2007 and a 3.7 percent increase from March 2008, Edmunds.com predicts. April 2008 had 26 selling days, two more than last April 2007. When adjusted for this difference, sales decreased 9.7 percent from April 2007.
“It’s clear that gas prices are weighing heavily on car-buyers’ minds," observed Jesse Toprak, Edmunds.com’s executive director of Industry Analysis. “We predict that this month, the segments with the most year-over-year growth will be compact SUVs and compact cars at 52 percent and eight percent, respectively.”
(Read more...)
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Porsche Charges Eavesdropping on CEO Via a Baby Monitor
The Porsche-Volkswagen saga is becoming more bizarre every day; the latest chapter includes charges of eavesdropping via a baby monitor.
Porsche confirmed Sunday night that it has filed a criminal complaint with authorities 
regarding a suspected attempt to eavesdrop on CEO Wendelin Wiedeking. A report by the German weekly Der Spiegel, picked up by the Wall Street Journal Monday, said the complaint came after the microphone of a baby monitoring device was discovered behind a sofa in a hotel suite a day before last year's meeting of the supervisory board of Volkswagen.
Porsche holds 31 percent of the shares of Volkswagen and is seeking a majority stake.
(Read more...)
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Kerkorian's Tracinda Builds Stake in Ford
He’s back and Ford is the object of his affection this time.
Last Vegas billionaire Kirk Kerkorian, through his Tracinda Corp., has amassed 100 million shares for a 4.7 percent stake in Ford just this month. Further, Tracinda said it plans to buy up to 20 million more shares at a premium to last week’s closing price.
Kerkorian’s move on Ford is a vote of confidence for Ford management led by CEO Alan Mulally and the company’s turnaround prospects.
(Read more...)
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Chrysler Puts Axle Plants Up for Sale
Chrysler has quietly begun looking for buyers for two Michigan axle plants – one still under
construction, sources told the Wall Street Journal, which says the move reflects the automaker’s search for a leaner business model.
Over the past two months Chrysler has approached two axle suppliers, Dana Holding Corp., which recently emerged from bankruptcy, and American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings Inc., which has been struck by workers at five plants since late February, about buying the two plants for about $400 million. The offer has also been made to private-equity groups, the newspaper reported in Monday’s edition based on comments from anonymous sources.
(Read more...)
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Speeding – and Limping – Out of Showrooms
By Michelle Krebs
German-brand cars zoomed off dealer lots nearly as fast as they arrived while Suzuki- and Korean-brand models limped out of showrooms, according to Edmunds.com’s days-to-turn analysis for March.
The just-introduced smart fortwo had the lowest days to turn. BMW and Mercedes-Benz were low as well. In contrast, Suzuki, Hyundai and Kia had the highest days to turn.
(Read more...)
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BMW Takes $370 Million Charge on Lower Prices, Rising Bad Debt
Falling prices and rising bad debt in the U.S. caused BMW to become the first major European industrial firm to fall victim to the credit crunch as the German automaker announced Thursday it was taking a $369-million charge, the Financial Times reported.
BMW, which announces first-quarter results on Tuesday, reaffirmed its full-year profit target of a slight increase over last year’s pre-tax level, the paper reported. But the automaker blamed the credit crunch for a sharp deterioration in used car prices, particularly in the U.S.
(Read more...)
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GM 1Q Global Sales Flat Thanks to North American Drop
By Bill Visnic
General Motors Corp. says its first-quarter 2008 global sales reached 2.25 million vehicles, a drop of less than one percent despite the drag of lagging North American sales.
GM sales of 947,000 units in North America was a roughly 10 percent drop compared with 2007’s first quarter. GM executive director of global market and industry analysis Mike DiGiovanni said the number “exceeded our internal forecasts,” but also says, counter to some industry analysts, GM does not expect U.S. sales to shore up in the second quarter. DiGiovanni said the company does not anticipate a firming U.S. market until at least the second half of the year.
(Read more...)
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Done at BMW But Now At Rolls-Royce, CEO Tom Purves Says Luxury Market will be Challenging
By Kate McLeod
Editor's Note: Auto Observer interviewed Tom Purves, chairman and CEO, BMW U.S. Holding Corp., in late March, as he still was scheduled to retire from the company. But this week, BMW announced Purves will remain, becoming CEO of the company's Rolls-Royce Motor Cars Ltd. division in the United Kingdom, starting in July. He spoke with Kate McLeod about his decades with BMW and the company's future in a toughening U.S. market.
Tom Purves has worked for BMW either 23 or 24 years. He can’t remember exactly.
In November, at age 60, he was scheduled to retire - but now will take over as CEO of BMW's Rolls-Royce unit. Purves leaves BMW as the company is dramatically expanding its production capacity in the U.S., and creating more niche vehicles. One is a stunning modernization of the iconic 2002, the 1 Series, and another, the X6, is so new it has no category or market.
That may sound idyllic but the current BMW management in Europe is in shuffle mode, which creates chaos. “It is not really, in a sense, for me to make a judgment whether it is unusual or not,” said Purves about all the management changes in Germany. “We in America are just passing the baton.”
(Read more...)
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Strategies Changing Quickly in the Green Game
By Dale Buss
As Earth Day comes around once more, there are a few different scoreboards for tracking the relative progress of automakers in their attempt to win the green derby.
According to Toronto, Canada-based consumer-research firm BrandIntel’s recent survey of online discussion, for example, Toyota, Honda, Mercedes and Volkswagen have the most “green credibility” due to their hybrid and diesel vehicles. General Motors and Chrysler have been stuck among the least-credible because of their large fleets of trucks and SUVs and weaker lineups of hybrids and diesel options. Ford sits in the middle.
But several automakers are forging strategies for changing such scoreboards in their green credentials. A look at a few:
(Read more...)
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Chrysler, Getrag Shift Into Drive for New Fuel-Saving Tranny
By Bill Visnic
Getrag Corporate Group and Chrysler LLC have signed the “definitive agreements” for the development, manufacturing and supply of Getrag’s high-tech Powershift automated-manual transmission earmarked for future Chrysler vehicles, Getrag announced earlier this month.
Getrag’s Powershift transmission incorporates the dual-clutch electrohydraulic components designed and developed by BorgWarner Automotive Inc. for its ground-breaking DuoTronic technology, first deployed in production vehicles by the Volkswagen Group, marketed as the Direct Shift Gearbox.
(Read more...)
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For Automakers, Green Mantle Could Become a Golden Cloak
By Dale Buss
Toyota clearly donned it for awhile. Ford tried it on for size. American consumers seem to think it fits Honda pretty well these days. But no one covets it more now than General Motors.
We’ll call it the “green mantle:” a figurative decoration on the shoulders of automaker that tells the world, and competitors, that their company is the most environmentally renowned in the industry, both for their products and technologies and – perhaps even more important – in the public’s overall regard.
And taken particularly in the context of an annual worldwide recognition such as today’s Earth Day, it seems at least as important for any corporation to earn the perception of environmental responsibility as to actually be doing something tangible.
(Read more...)
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Ford’s Drive One Could Be Right Campaign, Right Time
By Dale Buss
American consumers have had their long fling with raw power and size. They’re continuing to demonstrate that vehicle design is very important to them. And in a softening economy, there’s still nothing that speaks louder than price.
But Ford may be on to something with the new, omnibus Drive One marketing campaign that the company has been revealing in stages over the last few weeks – and plans to use for years. The effort is the first major manifestation of the marketing strategy that has been hatched at Ford over the last six months by Toyota émigré Jim Farley.
And in what it says both about Ford and about the state of the U.S. automotive market, Drive One may be able to create a fortunate synchronicity for the long-beleaguered OEM.
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Beijing Auto Show and China’s Auto Industry: Life in Fast-Forward
By Michelle Krebs
BEIJING – No more models dressed in cheesy mermaid costumes. Not a pink fur-covered Hello Kitty car in sight. Beijing’s auto show, like China’s auto industry and the country itself, has grown up and gained sophistication rivaling other global entities –almost.
And it has happened fast, as life does in China – life lived in fast-forward, as one expatriate auto company executive described it. 
The Beijing auto show is an analogy to the China auto industry – and Chinese economy generally: spectacular progress and phenomenal growth in the blink of an eye, but still a tad off in the final bit of refinement necessary to be considered world-class – a level assured to be achieved at some point.
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UAW Strikes GM, Dana Gets Ex-Toyota Exec
By Bill Visnic
The massive gears of the auto industry’s manufacturing sector continued to grind out a changing tune this week, reacting to larger, macroeconomic forces in the U.S. economy that are mandating interesting, if not wrenching, change, particularly for the domestic Big Three automakers.
On Thursday, union leaders for United Auto Workers Local 602, representing workers at General Motors Corp.’s Delta Township assembly plant near Lansing, MI, called a strike because the local has yet to sign a plant-level contract with GM, despite what it claims have been months of negotiation. The plant assembles GM’s new generation of crossover utility vehicles, the GMC Acadia, Saturn Outlook and Buick Enclave. The Enclave and Acadia have been selling briskly.
(Read more...)
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Niche-vehicle Producers Face Uncertain Future
By Pal Negyesi
Magna Steyr will build the forthcoming new Aston Martin Rapide; Bertone skips the Geneva Motor Show for the first time in 50 years amid financial woes; Pininfarina fights for survival just some of the recent headlines that reveal a mostly gloomy picture for contract manufacturers.
Long gone are the heydays of these companies. Back in the 1990s, major automobile manufacturers including Opel, Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz were looking for cost-effective ways to produce relatively smaller runs of special versions of their models. Design and engineering companies, including Bertone and Karmann were competing with each other for new business. As an example, in the early 2000s Austria-based Magna Steyr — which developed Mercedes-Benz's acclaimed 4Matic all-wheel-drive system — was manufacturing the 4WD versions of the E-class; Karmann was making a little more than 10,000 CLK convertibles a year in Germany; Bertone was churning out the Opel Astra convertible; and Pininfarina was happy with a lot of different models, including the Peugeot 406 coupe and the Mitsubishi Pajero Pinin mini off-roader.
(Read more...)
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VW Hopes ‘Max’ Advertising Builds on Sales Momentum
By Dale Buss
For Volkswagen Group of America executives, life is about as good as it can be right now -- given that U.S. car sales are at their lowest level in a decade, their dealers are starved for product, and the parent company still hasn’t figured out how to offset the growing currency-exchange disadvantage of producing in euros the vehicles that they sell in the United States.
Their good cheer results from the fact that VW has bucked the trend and posted a first-quarter increase in U.S. sales, including a 13% gain in March, and that a record five new and re-launched models will be streaming into dealerships as the year unfolds.
And one more thing: “Max” is now on the prowl. The personification of a black 1964 Beetle is the “mascot” of an ambitious new advertising and marketing campaign for Volkswagen called Das Auto, German for “the car.” The campaign “will build on Volkswagen’s unique place in pop culture through its message of ‘It’s What the People Want,’” Volkswagen Group said in a statement.
(Read more...)
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General Motors Hires Ex-Nissan McNabb
General Motors has hired former Nissan executive Mark McNabb and reorganized its sales, service and marketing divisions.
GM will have four brand channels -- Chevrolet, Saturn, Buick-Pontiac-GMC, and Cadillac-Hummer-Saab. McNabb will head the "premium" channel of Cadillac-Hummer-Saab.
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Chinese Automakers Report Higher Profits
On the eve of the opening of the annual Beijing motor show this weekend, two of China’s major automakers, Geely Automobile Holdings Ltd. and Dongfeng Motor Group Co., reported strong 2007 profits, Bloomberg News reported Wednesday.
Geely, China’s largest maker of its own brand models and has no foreign partner, said it doubled profits in the second half of last year, pushing full-year income 51 percent higher. State-owned Dongfeng, which builds vehicles with Honda, Nissan and Peugeot, reported its 2007 net profit rose 81 percent.
(Read more...)
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Automotive Supplier Woes Mount
After a brief respite last year, concern is again mounting about the financial health of hundreds – if not thousands – of component and services suppliers squeezed between falling orders from their carmaker customers, high raw material prices and tightening credit conditions, the Financial Times reported Wednesday.
J.P. Mortgan cut earnings estimates this week of several of the world's biggest Tier One automotive suppliers. They include American Axle -– against which workers have been striking for seven weeks now -- Lear, Magna International, TRW, Visteon and Tenneco. Lehman Brothers singles out American Axle, Lear and Tenneco as most vulnerable among General Motors' Tier One suppliers.
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China's Chery: Moving Forward With Chrysler Despite Nissan Link
So now that Chrysler has cut a deal with Nissan to make its small cars, what’s up with China’s Chery Automobile Co., which was supposed to be providing Chrysler with a small vehicle platform by now?
There’s room for both, Chrysler Vice Chairman Thomas LaSorda said in a conference call Monday. In fact, he said, the deal with Chery is proceeding, but he gave no timeframe for introduction of Chery-built Chryslers.
(Read more...)
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Chrysler, Nissan: Could More Product Swaps Be in Store?
By Michelle Krebs
When Chrysler and Nissan announced their latest model-sharing plans Monday, company executives hinted they were leaving open the door for further product discussions. The initial opening that led to the Chrysler-Nissan small-car-for-big-truck swap had been cracked in January when the two companies announced Nissan would supply Chrysler with a version of the Nissan Versa to sell in South America.
"We agreed to an open dialogue [in January] to continue to explore future product development and sharing opportunities," Dominique Thormann, Nissan's North American senior vice president for administration and finance, said in a conference call Monday. "And today is one milestone and a culmination of that intention."
One milestone? Could there be others? What could be next?
(Read more...)
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Chrysler, Nissan Link To Share Models
By Michelle Krebs
DETROIT -- Chrysler and Nissan announced late Monday that they will link to supply each other with
products. Nissan will make a small car in Japan for Chrysler; Chrysler will sell to Nissan full-size pickup trucks it makes in Mexico to replace Nissan's Titan.
The move was not completely unexpected. The two companies had left the door open for further cooperation when they announced in January that Nissan would supply Chrysler with a version of its small Versa car for the Detroit automaker to sell in South America.
Still, this most recent revelation adds fuel to the buzz that the two companies may ultimately form a full-blown alliance. Company spokesmen in separate conference calls Monday evening, however, insisted the newest announcement was merely “an OEM product exchange," not a more far-reaching business arrangement.
(Read more...)
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Volkswagen’s Global Sales Rise, Thanks to China, Brazil and New Models
Volkswagen AG reported its global sales rose and March as well as the first quarter on the
strength of China and Brazil and new models.
Volkswagen CEO Martin Winterkorn said in a statement that the German automaker's sales got a lift from the introduction of its VW Tiguan compact SUV and new-generation, best-selling Audi A4. Winterkorn said the automaker also is focusing on growth markets like China and Brazil to offset the slumping markets of the U.S. and Western Europe.
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Toyota, Isuzu Lead Japan Auto Shares Lower on U.S.
Shares of Toyota and Isuzu led Japanese car stocks lower in Tokyo Monday on concerns that a sales slump in the U.S. may cut into their profits, Bloomberg News reported.
Shares of Nissan, Yamaha and Fuji Heavy Industries, an affiliate of Toyota and the parent company of Subaru, also fell after it was revealed Friday that consumer confidence in the U.S. sank to a 26-year low in April, as gasoline prices rose and the labor market weakened.
Isuzu, Japan's largest truck maker, announced recently it would stop selling its sport-utility vehicles in the U.S. Last Friday, Toyota announced it was upping its stake in Fuji Heavy Industries and the two were developing a sports car together.
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Adios, Amigo: Isuzu Riding Off into American Sunset
By Peter Nunn
Call it the classic long goodbye. Isuzu has announced it will call a halt to North American SUV sales in January 2009, but the news shouldn’t come as too much of a shock to anyone who’s been watching Isuzu of late.
Fact is, Isuzu’s fortunes have been on the wane for some while now as its long-term tie-up with General Motors has slowly unraveled and it’s been forced to rely on rebadged GM vehicles to keep sales alive.
It’s a sad finale for a Japanese company that once built a whole batch of cool-looking enthusiast cars, such as the early '80s Impulse coupe and later I-Mark and Stylus sedans. A company that turned its hand to some very well received show cars, the 1989 4200R, the 1993 VehiCROSS and 2001 GBX, to name but three. A company that later forged a successful business building SUVs such as the Trooper, Rodeo and Axiom until the economics of a harsh business environment dictated otherwise.
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Toyota, Daihatsu and Subaru Join Forces on Product Development, Vehicle Sharing
By Michelle Krebs
Japanese automakers Toyota, Daihatsu and Subaru parent, Fuji Heavy Industries,
announced they have joined forces to develop new vehicles, including a small rear-drive sports car, and supply each other with cars. As expected, Toyota also doubled its stake in Fuji, a stake that could go even higher.
The agreement unveiled at a press briefing in Tokyo Thursday calls for the following product actions:
· Toyota and Fuji will jointly develop a compact rear-drive sports car to be marketed by both companies;
· Toyota will provide Fuji with a compact car;
· Daihatsu will supply Fuji with minivehicles and a version of the Daihatsu Coo compact car.
The trio's joining forces represents a sign of the times -- further consolidation of the global auto industry and increased cooperation among automakers to cut costs. The arrangement allows the companies to beef up their product portfolios, especially with slim-profit small cars, run assembly plants at full capacity and share development costs so no one company has to go solo on all such costs.
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Ford, Microsoft Find They're in ‘Sync’ with Young Buyers
By Dale Buss
One of the few highlights of the industry’s dismal sales picture in recent months has been the Ford Focus.
In an otherwise dismal month and quarter for industry sales, March retail sales for the Focus marked their highest level for any month since August 2005 – with retail sales up 36 percent in March and 35 percent in the first quarter compared with the same periods a year ago. Counting fleet sales, Focus sales were up 24 percent in March and 23 percent for the quarter.
The reason for higher retail sales, Ford says, is in large part because younger consumers were flocking to buy Sync, the in-vehicle connectivity system that has been featured lately in marketing for the subcompact car.
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Big Three Boost U.S.-Made Exports
Last year's landmark labor contracts and the weak U.S. dollar are breathing new life into U.S. auto plants as Detroit automakers boost exports of U.S.-made vehicles, the Wall Street Journal reports.
General Motors plans to export U.S.-made vehicles to Europe, China and Latin American markets such as Brazil; Chrysler is shifting production from Europe to the U.S. to take advantage of lower costs and available plant capacity; and Ford is considering ramping up exports if it can bring labor costs down, the business journal reported in Tuesday’s edition.
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Volkswagen Counts Heavily on Passat CC
Volkswagen is counting heavily on its newly launched Passat CC for future growth, as the
brand aims to sell 6.6 million vehicles a year by 2018, company executives said Tuesday at the launch of the new Passat CC in Germany and reported by Bloomberg News.
The automaker said it plans to sell 300,000 Passat CC models worldwide over the next six years. It will be sold in Western Europe, China, Japan and North America by autumn. The Passat CC, which made its debut in Detroit in January, may generate as much as a fifth of future sales of Passat models, the automaker estimates as reported by Bloomberg. Volkswagen has sold 15 million Passats worldwide over the past 35 years, making it the automaker's third best-seller after the Golf and the Beetle.
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Toyota, Subaru Are Becoming Increasingly Entwined
By Peter Nunn
TOKYO — Japan is buzzing with news that Toyota plans to raise its stake in Fuji Heavy Industries, Subaru's parent company, from 8.7 percent up to around 17 percent.
The story was broken by the Nikkei, Japan's well-connected business newspaper, has since been picked up by other media, not denied 
by either Toyota or Subaru.
Indeed, a spokesman from one of the companies admitted privately "the Nikkei got a scoop." All of which seems to back up the Nikkei's claim that Toyota will pick up 64.25 million shares in FHI for around ¥30 billion (some $306 million).
Ever since Toyota became the leading shareholder in Fuji Heavy Industries in October 2005 in the wake of the company’s hasty divorce from General Motors, many in Japan believed it was simply a matter of time before Toyota upped its stake.
So why now? Because up to a point, both companies need each other.
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BMW Sales Rise; Mini Sales Soar
BMW reported Monday its global sales rose 8.2 percent in March, with sales increases
across the line from Mini to Rolls-Royce and BMW brand in between.
BMW expects record sales this year, and Mini sales to reach 240,000 vehicles for the first time, in part, due to the addition of the longer Clubman wagon, just going on sale in the U.S. Mini is airing its first television commercial since it began selling cars in the States.
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Mazda: No Change in Incentives
Mazda plans to keep incentives in the U.S. unchanged even though sales fell more than the
overall market last month and some competitors are upping the incentive ante, Bloomberg News reported Monday.
“We will continue to try and manage it as best as we can, not to increase it just to chase volume,'' Daniel Morris, the company's head of marketing, told Bloomberg in an interview last Friday.
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BMW 1-Series Marks Automaker's Biggest Online Effort Yet
A campaign now under way for the BMW 1-Series makes extensive use of nontraditional
media and is trying to promote the tiny compact coupe and convertible as a "pure BMW," The New York Times reports.
Patrick McKenna, manager for marketing communications at BMW of North America in Woodcliff Lake, N.J., told The New York Times that the 1-Series introduction represents “the highest concentration of nontraditional media of any BMW launch.”
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Capacitors Get a Boost from Suzuki
By Bill Visnic
Battery talk has become favorite dinnertime discussion throughout the industry.
It’s been that way at least since General Motors Corp. started pumping up the volume about its Chevy Volt — a so-called “extended-range electric vehicle” concept car everyone wants to see come to production. But it won’t unless battery developers now working feverishly to perfect lithium-ion chemistry can whip up the right formula to allow the car to run for 35 or 40 miles purely on battery power.
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Hyundai to U.S. Dealers: 'Sell Many Cars'
Hyundai Motor Chairman Chung Mong-koo told U.S. dealers to sell more cars after they turned in a mixed performance in the first quarter. “I told (them) to sell many cars," Chung said to reporters following a meeting with 16 of the carmaker's U.S. dealers, Hyundai said in a statement cited by The Associated Press.
Hyundai was among the few automakers — and the only Asian automaker — to report a U.S. sales increase in March. The South Korean automaker sold 42,796 vehicles in March, for a 2 percent increase over the year-ago March. However, for the quarter, Hyundai sold 95,338 vehicles, down about 9 percent from the year-ago quarter. Indeed, Hyundai’s sales performance is mixed.
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Tata Sales: Commercial Vehicles Lead the Way as Small Car Sales Stumble
By Nick Kurczewski
MUMBAI, India — Numbers never lie, but they can sometimes bend the truth. Fresh from the media frenzy created by its introduction of the $2,500 Nano and its purchase of Jaguar and Land Rover from Ford Motor Co., Tata Motors reported a 5.9 percent jump in March sales compared with the same month the previous year.
Seems like the end of the story, and "job well done, Tata Motors." However, once you peel apart the numbers, this optimistic announcement becomes a mixed bag of good and bad news for the Indian automobile manufacturer.
The bump in overall sales comes solely from Tata’s booming commercial-vehicle business. The company's domestic sales of commercial vehicles in March 2008 totaled 35,993 units, a significant increase of 17 percent over the 30,720 vehicles sold in March last year.
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Think City, the Electric Car that Could Change Everything
By Nick Kurczewski
MONACO -- Jan-Olaf Willums, CEO of Think Global and the driving force behind the company’s new electric car, looked like his own batteries were nearly flat by the time AutoObserver sat down to chat with him at the EVER Monaco ecological car show. Held March 27-30, EVER Monaco is an annual exhibition of alternatively powered vehicles and energy systems. After a full day of interviews and roundtable discussions, Willums’ eyes looked weary, his tie was undone, and he bravely tried to stifle a yawn as we began the interview.
Five minutes into our conversation, the fog had lifted and Willums had hit his stride. His eyes were sharp, and the professorial-looking automotive CEO made it clear Think will not be content to simply reignite interest in electric vehicles. Think wants to revolutionize how customers buy a car, how they consume energy and even how they interact with their vehicle.
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TROY, Michigan -- Behind the introduction of the Saleen S5S Raptor at the New York International Auto Show in March is the story of a corporate reorganization that blends two companies previously struggling on their own.
