Some have quietly or openly been hoping the GM could cash-in on the misery of Japanese brands in China. It’s not happening. Sales across all of GM’s Chinese joint ventures were up a marginal 1.7 percent in September while sales of German marques received a boost. (Read More…)

It is something that will become increasingly common: Japanese carmakers launch cars at home in Japan, long after they have been introduced to emerging and emerged market elsewhere. This seems to hurt Japanese feelings. Today, Nissan presented the Latio at its headquarters in Yokohama, and the usually polite assemblage of media representatives turned into a growling pack. (Read More…)

We’ve been told again and again that pooled parts purchasing produces profits. Baloney, Opel interim-chief Thomas Sedran will say in an interview that Germany’s Tagesspiegel will publish tomorrow. He says something GM customers have known for a while: Parts from GM’s bin often are too expensive, and by sourcing them elsewhere, one can save a lot of money. “We are talking a significant order of magnitude,” Sedran will say tomorrow. (Read More…)

Renault wants to shift more production away from France, French union sources leaked to Reuters, and to maximize the disgrace, the jobs will go to Turkey, a country not in high regard in islamophobic French circles. Renault plans to build more than 70 percent of its Clio subcompacts in Turkey, the union sources said. Renault issued a weak denial that reads like a confirmation. (Read More…)

Volkswagen workers who make the Passat at the Emden factory in Germany are enjoying a mini-vacation. After the national holiday last Wednesday, which celebrated the fall of the wall and the re-unification, Volkswagen workers can celebrate falling sales of the Passat, and stay at home, says Germany’s Handelsblatt. Meanwhile, managers at Volkswagen are busy down–revising their production plans.
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Fiat/Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne casts longing eyes at GM’s palsied German daughter Opel, still, or again. Fiat was interested in taking Opel off GM’s trembling hands in 2009. Fiat is ready again, says the Italian business daily Il Sole 24 Ore, if Fiat gets a similar deal as with Chrysler: Opel for nothing, preferably with a cash sweetener. (Read More…)

Toyota’s sales in China took a big hit in September, reports by the Yomiuri Shimbun and Reuters say. Executives of Japanese carmakers are putting on a brave face when it comes to China, but are worried that their significant China business could become a casualty of the East China Sea troubles.

No official data are available yet, but the Yomiuri says that Toyota’s September sales in China “halved,” after many Chinese customers canceled their orders in September. Reuters talks about a 40 percent reduction. A senior Toyota executive told the usually very reliable Reuters that Toyota sold about 50,000 cars in China in September, down from about 86,000 in September 2011. (Read More…)

On Monday, Japan’s prime minister Yoshihiko Noda presented a new and improved cabinet, tailcoats and all. Apparently, that cabinet has few friends in Japan’s  auto industry.

Akio Toyoda, who took over the rotating chairmanship of the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association last May, sent a surprisingly strongly worded address to his new leaders. Speaking on behalf of all JAMA members, Toyoda said: (Read More…)

According to VW USA’s CEO Jonathan Browning, America is missing out on huge investments and new jobs due to our “rising debt and political discord.” In 1999, the U.S. did attract 41 percent of all global foreign direct investment. Now, the number is less than 20 percent. The money is going to places like China where Volkswagen has 12 plants and three more on the way, while there is only one in the U.S. Browning is talking in code about several facts of post-bailout automotive life. (Read More…)

Four 2013 models, the Lexus ES, the Hyundai Santa Fe, the Subaru XV Crosstrek, and the Dodge Dart received the coveted  “Top Safety Pick” award by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. (Read More…)

Detroit carmakers continue telling their fairy tale of the closed Japanese market, and their UAW members eagerly hang on their lips. Both don’t want to admit that their products are largely unsalable in Japan, and they blame the mythical bad Nipponese wolf instead. At the same time, sales of imported cars are up for the third straight month in Japan. Sales of imports were 35,841 in September, the highest since September 1996, data released by the Japan Automobile Importers Association shows. (Read More…)

Japanese carmakers are worried about their sales in China after Japanese cars were smashed and dealerships torched during large scale anti-Japanese riots in China last month. As a first indicator that Japanese cars may be falling out of favor in China,  Mazda reports via Reuters that September sales in China dropped 35 percent. (Read More…)

When a Japanese chemical factory blew up over the weekend, it looked like baby bottoms would be most affected. Nippon Shokubai is one of the world’s largest producers of acrylic acid, which in turn is a key ingredient for the making of disposable diapers. Apart from causing a diaper dearth, the explosion also “may send shock waves through the auto industry,” as The Nikkei [sub] says. (Read More…)

“We do not need incentives for natural gas technology to drive adoption,” Bill Larkin, CFO of Westport Innovations, a Vancouver-based developer of technology that allows truck and bus engines to run on natural gas, told Reuters in an interview:

 “It actually hurts the investment in this technology because the U.S. government has been dangling this carrot … and so investments are delayed.” (Read More…)

A successful test of the “biggest rocket fired in the UK for over 20 years” cleared the way for an attack on the 1,000 mph mark in a car. According to Reuters, the rocket will be twinned with a fighter jet engine from a Eurofighter Typhoon. With that new “hybrid,” the team behind the Bloodhound supersonic car wants to smash the existing world land speed record of 763 mph and go all the way to 1,000 mph. (Read More…)