GM’s CEO and Chairman Ed Whitacre confirmed today that Dutch boutique sportscar firm Spyker is the only bidder for what’s left of Saab after the BAIC deal. Saab insiders insist that the firm can continue without the old tooling and technology sold to BAIC, and they still have their hopes pinned on the new 9-5 model. But, as the WSJ reports, Spyker earned a mere €7.9m in 2008 revenue, and has already endured an €8.7m net loss in the first half of this year. Spyker’s in no position to be saving struggling Swedish automakers. But behind Spyker is Convers Group, a Russian banking group with deep pockets… and a uniquely Russian reputation.
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With the intellectual property and tooling for 9-5 and 9-3 models headed for Beijing, there’s less to Saab than ever. Sort of. The BAIC deal actually proved to be less dramatic than previously thought, netting the Swedish GM subsidiary a mere $197m according to Automotive News [sub]. BAIC had just obtained a $2.93b line of credit with Bank of China, so there was nothing stopping them from buying more… except GM’s unwillingness to hand over modern platforms. What BAIC did get out of the deal still isn’t entirely clear, but what is clear is that GM has received nothing from the Saab sale so far. That $197m was deposited into Saab’s Swedish account, according to sources speaking to di.se.
As a kid, I remember playing a little game to help pass the time on road trips: every time something low, wide and red drove past I’d shout “Ferrari!” and laugh as the other kids in the car got whiplash trying to catch a glimpse of the Corvette, Trans-Am, or 3000GT I’d purposefully misidentified. Perhaps Hofele had that game in mind when it designed this R8-alike-ish bodykit for the A5. Of course, it’s also possible that they just though it looks good. You never know with tuners.
In 2007, over 120,000 Civic Hybrid owners had a beef with Honda. So much so, in fact, that they sued the Japanese company. What do you reckon the reason could be? Unsafe cars? Think again. Poor build quality? No, they sued Honda because their Civic Hybrids didn’t get the stated fuel mileage. New York Times’ Wheels Blog reports that 2 plantiffs, John True of Ontario, California, and Gonzalo Delgado of Chino Hills California along with 120,000 other Honda Civic Hybrid owners argued in the United States District Court for the Central District of California that they were only getting 31 mpg instead of the advertised 49mpg in the city and 51 mpg on the highway. The plaintiffs believe that Honda’s advertising led them to believe that the Civic Hybrid would get better fuel economy than is likely in real world driving. Needless to say, the plaintiffs weren’t challenging the EPA methods of predicting mileage, just that Honda, allegedly, deceived customers by not making it clear that they were unlikely to achieve the EPA figures. Honda, naturally, have a different take.
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At least eighty-two motorists in Colorado Springs, Colorado may have been falsely accused of driving under the influence of alcohol (DUI) based on unreliable blood test results. After double-checking its own work, the city’s Metro Crime Lab on Friday admitted that out of 1000 tests conducted since January, no fewer than eighty-two results were inflated above the driver’s true blood alcohol content. More incorrect readings could be discovered as re-testing continues.
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Having worked at a Japanese language tv station in LA in the seventies, I developed an early appreciation of their commercials. Here are a couple of Datsun ads highlighting the Blubird/510. The first one parallels the flying theme of my CC, and the second one, after the jump, shows off the coupe version, which sadly was never exported to the US. Shades of the Volt dance. Enjoy! Read More >
GM Chairman and CEO Ed Whitacre has made his first real media availability today, answering questions on a number of issues including the deal that sent control of GM’s most important Chinese joint venture to its partner, SAIC. According to Whitacre, the deal was put in place by former CEO Fritz Henderson. “It was sort of done before I got here,” Whitacre tells Reuters. Not to worry though, Whitacre has met with his counterpart at SAIC and was assured that “the nature of the partnership would not change.” Meanwhile, Gasgoo all but confirms that the rationale behind the deal is competition in India’s small-car sweepstakes, as a $3,500 sub-Spark model is apparently being planned to compliment the GM-SAIC-Wuling commercial vans that will spearhead the effort. Given how crowded India’s small car market is shaping up to be, it’s interesting that Whitacre didn’t cancel the agreement as he did with Henderson’s deal to sell Opel to Magna. And as for Henderson’s departure? “There was just a common agreement that what you want to do is not what I want to do,” says Whitacre.
Old Volvo’s don’t die. They just get increasingly decrepit. But they’re far from alone in my neck of the woods. Cars in North Georgia enjoy a low salt, smooth road diet that can keep even the worst vehicles roadworthy. Hyundai Excel? A dozen here and there. Old AMC Pacer? The weirdo down the the road has one. The paint may be toast, but the body’s intact. An early 1990’s Honda Accord? Well now we’re talking about what I lovingly call ‘a beater leader’. Like Waffle House, Baptist Churches and Kudzu, they’re everywhere.
Cross-cultural alliances are the craze of the moment in the auto industry, particularly in the form of Europeans hooking up with Japanese partners. Renault & Nissan, PSA & Mitsubishi, Volkswagen & Suzuki and Bertel Schmitt & Tomoko (sorry, couldn’t resist it!) are just a few examples. Fiat, on the other hand, is not following the crowd. Moneycontrol.com reports that Luca di Montezemolo, Chairman of Fiat, is saying no ad un socio giapponese. “The others are doing what we have (already) done,” Montezemolo says. “This is a time when we have to be careful not get indigestion.” Is the Chrysler merger not sitting well on the stomach?
“We’re still dependent on each other,” Ford’s head of global product development Derrick Kuzak tells the Detroit News, dispelling rumors that Ford and Mazda are going their separate ways. “You cannot change that overnight.” According to Kuzak, many of Ford’s most important vehicles continue to be based off of Mazda platforms. Ford Chief Financial Officer Lewis Booth adds,
The strategic relationship continues. The business relationships continue. And they continue on the basis that they’ve always continued. Where it works to the benefit of both companies, we do things together, and where it doesn’t, we don’t.
Toyota is teasing this “dedicated hybrid concept vehicle” set to be fully unveiled at the Detroit Auto Show.
Ford will be taking a conservative approach to 2010, according to Chairman Bill Ford, who tells Automotive News [sub] that unemployment makes him most pessimistic about the year to come.
We’re not planning for a huge pickup next year. If we get one, great, we’ll ride it. We’re planning conservatively. Just as we did this year, we’ve kept our inventories low. If things start to pop for the better, we’ll adjust our production upward and go that way
And why not? Ford’s stock price has soared over the last year, since falling under $2 a year ago. This despite the fact that the Blue Oval is mortgaged to the hilt and will miss profitability for 2009. But because Ford believes that, as President of the Americas Mark Fields puts it, “our plan is working,” the bonuses are coming back for Ford’s white-collar employees.
Supposed battery and electric car maker BYD is giving Chinese car makers reasons to be worried. While BYD’s electric cars get all the headlines, BYD’s conventionally powered and aggressively priced F3 car has been a Chinese chart topper for many months. The F3 is one of the best-selling sedans in the Chinese market. As many months before, BYD’s F3 did lead China’s November sedan sales. Now, BYD is making this car abroad.
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Picture courtesy ACEA.be
According to hot-off-the-presses data compiled by the European car manufacturers association ACEA, new car registrations in Europe rose by 26.6 percent in November 2009. This looks like a healthy pop, but caution is in order: November 2008 had suffered a drop of 25.8 percent. As mentioned before, comparisons with post-carmageddon results must be treated carefully. For the first 11 months of the year, Europe is still down by 2.8 percent, composed of -0.7 percent in Western Europe and -27.4 percent in the new EU Member States. All in all, normalcy is slowly coming back to Europe, with Western Europe having a newfound appetite for cars, while Eastern Europe is still hesitant when it comes to new wheels.
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The Prius’ organically shaped battery vent was recognized by rwb. Congratulations! Now lets move on to a different body part, the A pillar. Does this one look familiar, or does it just seem that way, or are you seeing things? Wild guesses are good, so don’t be shy.
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