Nissan Reveals Light-Commercial Direction at Next Detroit Auto Show
May 05, 2008

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.

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MAZDA6 for America Arrives
May 05, 2008

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.

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April Car Sales: U.S. Consumers Flock to Cars, Gouging Detroit Three
May 02, 2008

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.

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Biofuels Stakes Rise for GM and the Nation
May 02, 2008

By Dale Buss

With its second major equity investment in a biofuels startup company in the space of five just months, General Motors is moving front and center in what may become a pivotal global economic development of our time: the rapid rise of the cellulosic-ethanol industry.

GM’s announcement on Thursday that it has made an equity investment in a Boston-based company, Mascoma Corp., is a bookend to its January deal to help fund Coskata Inc., based in Warrendale, Ill. The two companies, partially nurtured by academics, use two different processes to yield similar crucial results: the production of ethanol for fuel from non-grain, essentially waste sources.

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Gasoline Programs Could Be Next Wave of Incentives, Edmunds.com Predicts
April 30, 2008

SANTA MONICA, Calif. — As gas prices rise this summer, automakers may well turn to marketing programs that include free gasoline instead of or in addition to cash rebates and low-interest financing, Edmunds.com predicts.

“Gas prices are having a profound effect on the psychology of car-buyers, so we expect that automaker and dealer marketing tactics may include free gasoline programs this summer,” stated Jesse Toprak, executive director of Industry Analysis for Edmunds.com. "As indicated in Edmunds’ True Market Value Predictive Alerts, transaction prices of gas-guzzling large SUVs and trucks will likely continue to fall.”

Meantime, Edmunds.com estimated Thursday that the average automotive manufacturer incentive in the U.S. was $2,449 per vehicle sold in April 2008, up $13, or 0.5 percent, from March 2008, and up $39, or 1.6 percent, from April 2007.

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Chevrolet Malibu, Ford Fusion, Pontiac G6 Gain Traction in Crucial ‘C’ Segment
April 30, 2008

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.

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GM Partners With a Second Cellulosic Ethanol Maker
April 30, 2008

General Motors plans to announce Thursday a second partnership with a cellulosic ethanol maker. The automaker is providing no further details until GM President Fritz Henderson makes the announcement in Washington, D.C.

GM already has announced a partnership with an Illinois-based cellulosic ethanol maker, Coskata Inc., and last week said Coskata was establishing a pilot plant in Pennsylvania to demonstrate its innovative process of converting a variety of materials, from garbage to agricultural waste, into ethanol.

GM's partnerships for developing cellulosic ethanol come against a backdrop of increasing outcry for the industry to quit using corn-based ethanol, as food prices rise.

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GM Downgrades 2008 Industry Vehicle Sales Forecast
April 30, 2008

Previously more optimistic than other automakers, General Motors Wednesday announced it had downgraded its U.S. vehicle sales forecast for 2008. GM now expects industry sales to come at in the mid to high 15 million units range, instead of the low 16 million. GM had predicted some upturn in the second half.

GM President Fritz Henderson, in a conference call with analysts and media on first-quarter earnings Wednesday, said April sales, which will be reported Thursday, look like the weak sales throughout the first quarter.

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GM Loses $3.25 Billion in the First Quarter
April 30, 2008

General Motors Wednesday reported it lost $3.25 billion in the first quarter due slow U.S. vehicle sales, losses at its finance unit and plant shutdowns caused by a strike against one of its suppliers.

Analysts expected GM to post a loss, which was the automaker's third consecutive quarterly loss and compares with a profit of $62 million in the year-ago quarter. However, the loss was less than analysts had forecasted thanks to GM's rising sales in Asia and Latin America that helped offset the slump in the U.S.

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Rick Suzuki: Fall on Sword Justified?
April 30, 2008

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.

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