Germany’s new car sales were up 3.8 percent in April, says Germany’s Kraftfahrtbundesamt. This is the first time in nearly a year that German car sales were in plus territory. In France, an April loss of 5.2 percent already was feted as the turn-around. Has the European bottom been reached?  I don’t think so. Read More >

German autoworkers want their share of the record profits announced by German carmakers last year. IG Metall labor union demanded 5.5 percent. Employers countered with 2.3 percent. Today, workers went on strike. Read More >

Porsche is looking to fill 1,400 jobs in for its expanded factory  in Leipzig, where the new Macan SUVlet will be built by the end of the year. A lot of these jobs will go to current Opel workers, says Germany’s Focus. Read More >

After plans failed to sue Porsche in America, where juries are impressionable and awards are rich, the lawsuits are now in Germany, where courts are cautious, and where professional judges need to be convinced. The wheels of justice crank slowly. Read More >

Bob King’s attempts to ingratiate himself with German unions, and to make Opel’s Bochum workers reconsider their decision to turn down Opel’s restructuring plan, are being ignored. Actually, it appears as if they had the opposite effect. Days after King’s comment, Bochum plant manager Manfred Gellrich rejected new discussions, saying Opel does not want to “waste precious time,” Reuters says. Over the weekend, Opel dropped another bomb: Bochum will be closed completely. A parts depot that was supposed to stay open, will also close its doors. Read More >

“The coming months will be anything but easy,” Volkswagen CEO Martin Winterkorn told Reuters today at VW’s annual shareholders’ meeting. Nevertheless, he still plans to rule the world. Read More >

UAW boss Bob King told Opel’s Bochum workers to vote again, and to this time accept a deal that had been worked out between the German metal worker union IG Metall and GM. Read More >

Badge engineering: Kangoo, Dokker, Citan

Condition red at Daimler: Germany’s influential auto club ADAC gave the Mercedes Citan only three out of five stars in the Euro-NCAP-Crashtest. The loss of stars means “a meltdown” for the starred brand, says Automobilwoche [sub], “after all, the vehicle is supposed to excel with supreme safety.” Read More >

The American justice system has shown a large degree of overreach in the not so distant past, punishing or shaking down foreign companies for misdeeds performed on foreign soils by foreign perpetrators on foreign victims. This is not a matter of right or wrong. It is a matter of jurisdiction and sovereignty. Enough is enough, says the U.S. Supreme Court and decided to hear Daimler’s appeal  against a decision by a San Francisco court that  workers or relatives of workers at an Argentina-based plant operated by Mercedes-Benz, a wholly owned subsidiary of Daimler, can sue for alleged human rights abuses performed by Daimler in the 1970s in collusion with Argentina’s then military junta. Daimler had been on the receiving end of judicial overreach in the past. Read More >

At the Shanghai Auto Show, which opens to the public on April 21, and to tens of thousands of alleged members of the media the day before, the child of one of the auto industry’s oddest couples will be shown – at least in prototype form. It is the Denza EV, the product of a mésalliance between the world’s oldest and proudest automaker, Daimler, and a company that entered the annals of contemporary automotive history as the most brazen rip-off artist.

Of course we are talking of BYD, the Shenzhen, China, based maker of half the world’s cellphone batteries and a dwindling number of cars. A while ago, I visited an intrepid team of German engineers, shacked up at BYD, to jointly develop an electric car. They were friendly, hospitable, and as forthcoming as possible under the strange circumstances. For months, I could not bring it over me to put my fellow countrymen and expats in the dim light this story would project. Their job is tough enough. But in the interest of timeliness and journalistic duty, here it goes.
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As the owner of a geriatric, but otherwise well maintained car, you know that getting parts can be a bitch. Depending on company policy, ex-factory supply of parts can cease after 12, or, if you are the lucky customer of a more dedicated maker, 15 years after the end of regular production.  BMW now goes against that trend and offers parts for a car that went out of style 73 years ago. Read More >

Opel’s Supervisory Board, with half of its members delegates of the labor union, decided today the first closure of a German car factory in decades. According to Reuters, “Opel will end producing Zafira MPVs at its 50-year old Bochum plant by the end of next year, a move that has triggered a rare and public split within union ranks following months of tough negotiations.”

The closure will lead to the loss of 3,000 jobs in Bochum, as part of Opel’s attempt to put an end to 15 straight years of losses in Europe. It will be a while. Read More >

Red alert for armchair marketing strategists: Daimler plans what surely will be branded as an inexcusable watering down of its brand equity: The Mercedes brand is working on a series of very small (under 4 meters) and affordably priced (17,000 to 20,000 Euro) cars. Read More >

Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel made appreciative noises over the 4 billion EUR GM wants to invest into Opel through 2016, but gave no indication that she is willing to chip in. Read More >

GM CEO Dan Akerson and his dispatched-to-Europe fixer Steve Girsky emphatically denied that its loss-making Opel arm is up for sale or might be merged into a joint venture with equally loss-making  Peugeot. Read More >