As Mercedes-Benz USA prepares for its two-year move from New Jersey to Atlanta, the question is how the city scored this win in the first place. Turns out Atlanta is pushing its own brand as that of an automotive industry hub for the Southeastern United States.
Just like when high fuel prices knocked down the sale price of many a truck and SUV, the current drop in price at the pump is pulling down the prices for many a hybrid, PHEV and EV.
Skipping Chicago after Detroit as far as debuts are concerned, Lexus will unveil its 2016 RX 350 at the 2015 New York Auto Show in April.
The U.S. market, long in need of an affordable, compact, rear-wheel-drive sports car, allowed the hype to initially take hold. The Scion FR-S’s best ever month was its first full month of availability – June 2012 – when 2684 copies were sold.
But in the second-half of the FR-S’s first full year in the U.S., FR-S volume slid 4%.
• FR-S accounts for 24% of U.S. Scion sales
• Scion accounts for 2.4% of Toyota Motor Sales, USA, Inc. volume
• Subaru sold 25,492 WRX/STi Imprezas in 2014
The numbers weren’t terribly low. 18,327 FR-Ss were sold in the U.S. in 2013. But they weren’t terribly high, either. Nissan, for a reference point, sold 36,728 350Zs in 2003.
Regardless, only 18 months into the car’s tenure, monthly declines became notable because of their severity and consistency. Read More >
We haven’t shied away from discussing the error of Volkswagen USA’s ways here on TTAC nor the results of those ways. Yet while the brand saw its U.S. market share fall from a measly 2.6% in 2013 to 2.2% in 2014 and group-wide market share fell from 3.9% to 3.6%, year-over-year, VW Group market share in the United Kingdom grew by half a percentage point to 20.7% in 2014.
True, the Volkswagen brand itself saw its market share fall despite year-over-year volume growth of 4%. Volkswagen is the UK’s third-best-selling brand behind Ford and GM’s Vauxhall.
I’m sure there’s a good reason it hasn’t been done yet, but I’m going to ask for it anyways: how about a 3.5L EcoBoost V6 Mustang? Why not call it a Shelby GT500?
With the Volkswagen Tiguan going bigger for the United States market in 2017, senior execs believe a smaller entry-level crossover could soon take its place.
Despite the ongoing drop in oil prices, General Motors CEO Mary Barra said her company would stay the course as far as fuel efficiency is concerned.
A Ford engineer responds to our last piece on the Ford GT.
In “Ur-Turn: The Hater’s Guide to the Ford GT”, we get a glimpse into the Ford product development cycle for high-volume vehicles. The authors, who humbly claim that it was a broad overview, give a rather complete account of the roles, responsibilities, and procedures behind nearly every Ford product that comes to market. It’s a fascinating process, and it occurs every day at virtually every OEM and supplier. But what happens when a particular design or system defies convention? How do you validate something that is unlike anything your company has ever produced? What happens when you push the product development envelope so far, that you enter a completely new and unfamiliar design space? This is where we’ll find the Ford GT.
Curious fact: America’s two best-selling premium brands and one of the two fastest-growing premium brands are the three premium brands which rely the least upon SUVs and crossovers in the U.S. market.
We correctly believe that much of the growth in the luxury vehicle sector over the coming half-decade will be in the CUV category, but there’s no denying that the major players established productive, popular, profit-generating passenger car lineups many years ago.
• Most new crossovers introduced in 2014 were “premium”
• Majority of Jaguar-Land Rover, Acura, Lincoln sales come from utilities
• Porsche and Cadillac generate half their U.S. volume with utilities
SUVs and crossovers are assisting these brands – BMW, Mercedes-Benz, and Audi – in finding new avenues for growth, but their car divisions are large volume tools.
The same can’t be said for many of the mid-tier and low-volume luxury brands. Cars accomplish very little for Acura and Jaguar-Land Rover, generate only half of Cadillac’s volume, and produce only 45% of Lincoln sales. Read More >
One month after Toyota began sales of its Mirai FCV in Japan, around 1,500 have been ordered thus far, well over the 400 the automaker thought it would sell for the entirety of 2015.
Though the new Smart Fortwo is coming to showrooms in the United States later this year, the Electric Drive model won’t be available just yet.
Tesla shareholders felt lighter Wednesday after the automaker’s stock price fell from just over $200/share to $186.09/share after CEO Elon Musk’s announcement at the 2015 Automotive News World Congress in Detroit — held during the 2015 Detroit Auto Show — that his company wouldn’t be profitable until the start of the 2020s.
The Nissan Micra has officially lost its title as “Canada’s Least Expensive New Car”. Now, the cheapest new car is now the Hyundai Accent.
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