Real Chinese brands are losing market share to joint ventures. The Chinese government wants to keep up appearances, and strongly suggests to joint ventures with foreigners that they should start a separate “Chinese” brand. Latest to say “hao” (yes, ok, jawohl) is Daimler.  Its joint venture with BYD to make electric cars in China will dispense with making electric Mercedes first and will instead immediately head to second base and launch a Chinese brand. (Read More…)

Daimler has attracted the wrath of Wikipedia. An anonymous Wikipedia editor had “corrected” a harmless entry about Daimler’s lobbying activities. The edit was caught. The IP address was traced back to “a server of Daimler AG,” writes Der Spiegel.  All hell broke loose. (Read More…)

“A stands for attack,” pronounced  Dieter Zetsche, CEO of Daimler Benz, in Geneva, With a quivering stach, Dr. Z unveiled Daimler’s new attack dog, the new A-Klasse. (Read More…)

Global sales of Daimler’s Mercedes-Benz car brand rose a whopping 20.3 percent in February compared to February 2011, Reuters says. A lot of this growth comes from a country already pronounced a basket case by some: China.   (Read More…)

While the rumormill is rife with talk of Infiniti/Mercedes alliances for small, front-drive cars, one of the products to come out of the tie-up might be a luxury car for Renault.

(Read More…)

From Bloomberg’s intellectual property news, February 15, 2012:

“Daimler AG (DAI)‘s Chrysler unit’s Super Bowl advertisement featuring Clint Eastwood was temporarily taken down from Google Inc. (GOOG)‘s YouTube video-sharing service Feb. 13 following an infringement claim from the National Football League, the Baltimore Sun reported. (Read More…)

Mercedes-Benz 320 (W 142 series, 1937 to 1942) in the Streamline Saloon version, also known as “Autobahn Kurier”, 1938.

In 1937, Mercedes-Benz had a familiar problem: It lacked a car in what we would today call the “obere Mittelklasse,” or the upper middle class, that sweet spot between medium-sized vehicles and top-of-the line. Apparently, auto managers already engaged in the art of positioning. At least, that’s what the “Allgemeine Automobil-Zeitung” (AAZ or “General Automotive Magazine”) wrote when Mercedes showed its 3.2 liter Mercedes-Benz Type 320 (W 142 series) at the International Automobile and Motorcycle Exhibition (IAMA) in Berlin in February 1937. (Read More…)

Do you live in or near a Cuban community? Drive a Mercedes? Noooooo! Leave it in the garage. Put a tarp over it.

The Cuban community hates Mercedes and Daimler Chairman Dieter Zetsche, despite his Cuban-sized mustache. Casus belli: At a presentation at the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Zetsche praised the virtues of car sharing. Car sharing?

Zetsche said: (Read More…)

Are you the King of Spain, the Sultan of Brunai, Jay-Z, or the Russian oil billionaire Roman Abramovich? Check your mailbox. Volkswagen’s Bentley has sent you mail. Bentley wants to grieve with you over the passing of your beloved Maybach brand, and then, in a tasteful way, hopes will be expressed that your next car will be a Bentley.

In November, Daimler announced that it will bury Maybach (for an eulogy fittingly written by Jack Baruth, click here). This allegedly caused tears amongst the über-rich. (Read More…)

It’s not that the cross-sharing of technologies between Renault-Nissan has been a well-kept secret. However, it is good to hear that loose alliances between unlikely partners work, while a marriages made in the automotive compatibility heaven (we are looking at you, Volkswagen & Suzuki) don’t even get to the consummation part.

Renault-Nissan announced today in Detroit that its Decherd, Tenn., plant will build Mercedes-Benz 4-cylinder engines for Infiniti and Mercedes-Benz starting in 2014.

Read this sentence carefully. (Read More…)

Finally, a day later, the two German primadonnas, Daimler and BMW, handed in their homework, and America can get on with its life, knowing that Americans bought 1,243,784 light vehicles in December. This brought annual sales in the U.S. to the official total of 12,778,885 units, up 10 percent over 2010.

Now for the primadonnas. (Read More…)

Usually, all automakers in the U.S. market report together on the same day of the month. This time it’s different. The world does not know exactly how many cars Americans bought in December and therefore for the year, because Daimler and BMW had not handed in their numbers.

BMW and Mercedes had been in a year-long battle for the luxury crown, a title that oddly enough only has cachet in the otherwise monarchy-averse U.S.A. where kings are used to measure beds and burgers. With annual sales in the quarter million territory, both players would be Mazda-sized, would it not be for the (sometimes doubtful) “luxury” title. (Read More…)

Germany’s luxobarge makers aren’t just happy selling their luxobarges to China. Now they want Chinese money straight up. Daimler is flirting with the Chinese sovereign wealth fund China Investment Corporation (CIC), which may want to buy 5 or 10 percent of Daimler. (Read More…)

The Chinese stock market is way down. Real estate speculation had reached its zenith a while ago, and prices are on a downward trajectory. So are prices of luxury cars. Now is the time to get great deals on a BMW, or a “Benz,” as they call a Mercedes in China. Dealers are killing each other with discounts to move the high-end metal. Says China Daily: (Read More…)

Many, many years ago, I had after shaves from Aramis and other expensive sounding French companies on my bathroom shelf. My agency had the account for a (now defunct) men’s series called “Care.” The ads always showed a naked man. I was not invited to work on the stuff and wrote about sexy things like double wishbones and overhead camshafts instead. I must have dreamt all that. Because today, Daimler sent me an email, announcing that they just launched “The first fragrance for men.” Not “their” first fragrance for men. “The” first fragrance for men. (Read More…)