As inventories of Ford’s Fusion continue to outpace demand — the result of a second plant brought online last year to keep up with demand for the newly redesigned midsize sedan — the automaker has been raising incentives to move more Fusions out of the lot.
The Canada-only Nissan Micra debuts in April, with Nissan hoping to pick up overall market share in The Great White North. But Automotive News reports that one casualty of the Micra’s introduction will be the Versa Sedan – hardly a surprise when both compete at the absolute low end of the market.
Even though I skipped or slept through most of my senior year Classical Civilizations course (sorry, Ms. Rogow), one of the laminated quotes in the drafty class room always caught my eye – the quip that forms the pretentious title of this entry, which translates to “it’s difficult to not write satire”.
Ahead of its world debut at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain prior to making the rounds at the Geneva and New York auto shows next month, Ford has unveiled its redesigned 2015 Focus.
Sometime this week, Tesla CEO Elon Musk will announce everything there is to know about the EV automaker’s Gigafactory, from location and price tag, to its heavy reliance on renewable energy sources.
Along with the Dodge Avenger, the Chrysler 200 convertible won’t be returning to showrooms alongside the upgraded 2015 model.
As automakers seek out technology partners for their on-board electronic devices, Ford is leaving Microsoft by the side of the road for a variant of BlackBerry’s QNX-based operating system in future updates to the Blue Oval’s long-suffering SYNC/MyFord Touch infotainment systems.
Although the Honda Accord finished second to the Toyota Camry in the official sales rankings, Honda is touting the Accord’s dominance in retail sales, which accounted for 98 percent of overall Accord sales. By contrast, Bloomberg reports that Toyota’s retail mix for the Camry was 84 percent, with 342,007 Camrys ending up in the hands of retail customers. The Accord sold 360,089 units at retail.
The Dodge Avenger was a contentious topic on TTAC. For some, it made the Dart redundant, offering the cheapest 283 horsepower money could buy. For others, it was a dreadful pile of crap, fit for sub-prime buyers, rental fleets and not much else.
Joining the Volkswagen GTI and GTD is the new Golf GTE, a performance plug-in hybrid that puts down as much power as a GTI. According to AutoExpress, a prototype they drove last year hit 62 mph in 7.6 seconds while emitting 60 percent less CO2 than a Toyota Prius. Power comes from a 1.4L TSI 4-cylinder engine making 148 horsepower, mated to a 108 horsepower electric motor.
Former Renault executive and incoming PSA Peugeot Citroen CEO Carlos Tavares aims to use the 3 billion euro investment made in the three-way pact between the automaker, the French government and Dongfeng as part of a 5.27 billion euro makeover of the automaker’s line of vehicles over the long-term.
Tesla announced their Q4 2013 earnings saw a total net loss of $16 million while pulling in an annual revenue of $2 billion on the strength of higher sales and more efficient manufacturing methods.
The Scion FR-S – lightweight, affordable sports car that the world was supposedly waiting for – is reportedly lagging behing its sales targets across the globe, making it difficult for Toyota to justify upgrading the engine or bringing a convertible to market.
The Infiniti Q50 Eau Rouge was one of the more underwhelming concepts at NAIAS. Apparently we’ll find out what’s under the hood at the Geneva Auto Show. The video above shows off the concept’s engine sounds, and it has a distinct exhaust note that certainly doesn’t sound like a V8 engine. What’s most striking are the very audible wastegate sounds, confirming that it is a turbocharged engine. In the Baby Boomer era, the V8 rumble was the audible manifestation of speed and horsepower. For the new generation, it’s the wooosh and psshhhtt of turbochargers and blow-off valves.
Mazda moved nearly 80,000 CX-5s from the lot to the highway in 2013. If the automaker has its way this year, the C segment crossover may break 100,000 units sold.
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