Everyone knows what a Hofmeister Kink is… but until today’s debut of the Infiniti JX, nobody had ever heard of a Hofmeister Curve. Well, here it is… what do you think of it? Gimmick or gamechanger?

In a press release announcing the new 2013 Lexus GS, Lexus group vice president and general manager Mark Templin explains the sports sedan’s mission as follows:

Today, buyers in the mid-size luxury segment want a more engaging driving experience, styling that makes a statement, and a roomier interior package. With the all-new GS, we’re giving them what they asked for, and more.

And if the new GS looked more like the LF-Gh concept, we might agree. But with its toned-down looks failing to move the game past its foregettable forbears (at least in these 2-D images), it seems as though Lexus listen too hard to the customer (for example, creating more space with the same dimensions) and missed an opportunity to create a design that makes a statement that buyers didn’t yet know they couldn’t live without. Tarted-up midsized front-drivers are one thing, but this class of larger, rear-drive sports sedans demands bold yet sophisticated looks… and I’m not convinced this Lexus is “there.”

Think the Q5 is a bit too small? Do you find the Q7 altogether too large? You’re in luck! Rather than simply continuing to bracket the meat of the German luxury SUV market, Audi is stretching and widening its Q5 chassis in order to directly challenge the “just right” Mercedes ML/BMW X5 segment. The end result is supposed to look more coupe-like (read: more BMW X6-like) than this pieced-together mule, as Auto Motor und Sport calls the Q6 the “sporting connection between Q5 and Q7.” Let’s hope those wild test wheels are an option when Q6s start rolling off production lines sometime in 2014.

Nearly three years ago, I penned an entry to TTAC’s Volt Birth Watch entitled “You Should Have Been Born A Cadillac.” True to its name, the piece argued that,

the Volt’s bailout-fodder status requires some kind of volks wagen appeal; while a $40k Chevy is a tough pill to swallow, a taxpayer-funded [Volt-based] Cadillac could create a nasty backlash.

Now that the taxpayers are off of GM’s radar, the plan is going through: GM has announced that it will build a production version of the Converj concept, to be called the “ELR” per Caddy’s alphanumeric naming scheme. Rollout, pricing and performance targets haven’t yet been released, but a production-intent concept will be shown at the upcoming Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance. And though more profit out of an already-developed drivetrain makes worlds of sense, GM now has to explain why its luxury brand is getting Chevy’s leftovers with a freshly tailored suit. Hopefully GM will pull off this relatively minor PR hurdle with more aplomb than, say, Lincoln’s attempts to explain that features available in most Fords, like EcoBoost and SYNC/MyTouch, are what makes its cars so luxurious. After all, shouldn’t luxury brands be at the technological forefront, with features trickling down into the mass-market brands?

Does the world need another luxury car brand? Hold up, let me rephrase that: does the world need another $250k luxury crossover with a new brand that sounds like a bad Infiniti knockoff? Well, whether we need it or not, it’s coming… and from Britain, not China! Or maybe it does?
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Despite marketing its Lincoln brand as “not just luxury… it’s smarter than that,” Ford has finally admitted what the car guy world has been saying for some time: Lincoln isn’t a luxury brand… it’s a rebadge brand. Ford’s product honcho Derrick Kuzak tells Automotive News [sub] that the jig is up and there will be

No more badge engineering

Promise?
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The US won’t be receiving the hatchback version of the forthcoming, front-drive Mercedes A-series, but we will be getting this “CLC” four-door coupe based on the same platform. But, if American owners can’t tell the difference between front- and rear-drive, will this CLC cannibalize the C-Class? According to AutoBild, it will be only 2cm shorter than the C-Class sedan, and its wheelbase is only 6cm shorter. In Europe, they say the CLC will be bought by 45-50 year-olds with two kids and enough money to spend €5k more than the average A-Class buyer. But in the US, where this will form the Mercedes entry level, and where shoppers tend to be more value-oriented, couldn’t you see a cheaper, front-drive/AWD CLS lookalike stealing sales from the rather subdued C-Class?

Even if the Acura TL SH-AWD 6MT were not a good car, it would still deserve our support as the only upscale midsize sedan available with both all-wheel-drive and a manual transmission in North America. Even BMW has vacated this space. You can still get the 5-Series with either all-wheel-drive or a manual transmission, but not both in the same car. If you need all-weather capability and ample space for four adults, but also want to row your own, the TL is it. So, what are you stuck with?

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By late 2012, BMW will be showing the world a facelifted version of its current 7-Series flagship, in hopes of extending its new dominance in the luxury thermonuclear wars. But, with Mercedes determined to retake the throne, it’s developing an all-new S-Class, to debut in early 2013. Known as the 222, this new S-Class will reportedly be styled with an eye towards the 2007 F700 concept, and will debut in Detroit rather than Beijing, where the updated 7er will launch. For now though, it’s rolling around in heavily-camouflaged mule form, practicing the fine art of luxury before going into battle with the Bavarians. With all the hopes of the Mercedes brand on its back, this next-generation luxury warrior has a lot to live up to.

Few topics attain as much attention as something only a few can afford: Luxury cars, with special emphasis on who sells the most.

While some snootily state that a lot of these cars can’t possibly be listed as luxury comment, Connolly leathernecks battle in the burlwoods.  The war for luxury-leadership is fought on a global scale, where Dr. Z. exhorts his troops to fight back the onslaught of the Bavarian Barbarians. Month after month, skirmishes for market share erupt on U.S. shores as well. (Read More…)

About a minute into this clip, the auto industry’s most ubiquitous reporter John McElroy reveals that he’s seen three future Lincoln concepts and insists that they

definitely signal that a big change is coming.

What he doesn’t say: what they look like or what the “big change” is… which is enough to make any inveterate skeptic wonder whether McElroy is shooting straight or if saying what he did was a condition of being shown the “future products.” What McElroy does reveal is that Lincoln now has

its own unique design studio located within Ford’s product development center in Dearborn Michigan, with its own unique design team. That has not been done in modern times.

Unfortunately, as Cadillac’s recent history proves, new design is just part of the successful luxury brand equation. Unique platforms are another. Strong marketing is another. Lincoln may be taking the first steps in the right direction, but it’s got a long, long way to go…

With BMW breaking new eco-friendly premium ground with its “i”-branded concepts, it seems Audi does not want to be out-greened… or out-weirded. This “Audi e-tron Urban Concept” was seen in Berlin’s Potsdammer Platz, ahead of its introduction at the forthcoming Frankfurt Auto Show, where we’ll doubtless learn more about why this is the future for environmentally correct urban dwellers. For now though, all we know is that it’s heavily Messerschmitt Kabinenroller-inspired, as Autobild reports that it features tandem seating and a slide-back canopy along with its modern carbon fiber construction and electric drivetrain. From the look of this video though, the most surprising part of this car (to Berliners, anyway) appears to the Audi badge. What a strange new world we live in…

With the luxury market defying sluggish economic conditions, Daimler CEO Dieter Zetsche doesn’t want the upstarts at BMW and Audi to slip past it… which they are. Six months through 2011, the Mercedes brand found itself in third place among the German global luxury brands, at 610,531 units. A surging BMW captured 689,861 sales in the half, while Audi took second with 652,970. This, for Zetsche, is an unthinkable state of affairs.  In a letter to his employees, excerpted by Automotive News Europe [sub], Zetsche makes it clear that leadership in the luxury space is a Daimler birthright.

Some of our competitors are now growing faster and more profitably than we are. Granted, those are just snapshots in time and should not be overestimated. After all, many of our best new products are yet to come… In the long run we can’t be content to be in a “solid second” or even “third” place: We are Daimler – we should be far ahead of the pack! And if that requires something that we don’t currently have, then we’ll identify and develop it.

Enjoy your summer and refill your tanks. Because in the second half of this year we’re going to continue to play some hard offense!

Ian Callum, designer of the Aston-Martin DB7 (along with the new Jaguars and numerous other gorgeous things) is a really, genuinely nice guy. But even nice guys have their limits, and having seen his groundbreaking Aston design evolve with the morphological dynamism of a sturgeon over the last 17 years, Callum appears to have reached his. Bloomberg reports:

It’s still that same old basic design,” Ian McCallum, who designed the DB9 and is now design director at Tata Motors Ltd. (TTMT)’s Jaguar Land Rover unit, said in a July 27 interview. “Some will argue that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. But you do get to a time when you have to move on.”

Sadly, there are a few factual distractions to deal with here before we dig further into Aston’s predicament. First of all, though a Scot, the man’s name is Callum, not McCallum. Also, it’s not clear how much of the DB9 was styled by Callum, and how much was finished by his successor, Heinrik Fisker. Clear? OK, back to Aston…

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Polk’s Tom Libby takes a penetrating look into the obvious and reveals that American luxury car buyers rarely actually buy their cars, reporting:

Industry-wide, leases comprise about a fifth of all new vehicle registrations, but within the luxury market, lease penetration is more than twice as high at 45%. Three premium makes: BMW, Infiniti and Mercedes-Benz, actually have national lease rates at or above 50%…

These extraordinarily high lease results lead to several conclusions. First, the price of the vehicle is not the be-all and end-all. Rather, the monthly lease payment is a crucial factor. The monthly payment is not completely linked to the price, as the OEM and dealer have several tools by which to manipulate the monthly payment; these include, among other things, artificially raising the forecasted residual amount and increasing/decreasing the up-front lease payment. Second, if your premium make is not in the leasing business, you need to get there right away. Lastly, your lease rates, residuals and drive-away costs need to be competitive.

While there’s a lesson about America’s ceaseless desire to live beyond its means in there somewhere, the real lesson here is this: with sales coming out tomorrow, be sure to remember that not all of them are actual sales. Also, this is the reason you never see those “Don’t Laugh, It’s Paid Off” stickers anymore…