Just days after Mahindra’s diesel-powered compact pickups were approved by the EPA for sale in the US, the Indian automaker apparently canceled its distributor agreement with Global Vehicles according to the message above that was posted to Mahindra’s Media site. Global Vehicles has had a deal to distribute Mahindra pickup and SUV models in the US since 2006, and has signed up 350 dealers to sell the Indian imports. Recently cracks in the relationship surfaced when GV sued Mahindra alleging that the manufacturer was delaying homologation for the US market. GV claims to have spent $35m preparing for Mahindra’s US launch, and dealers were said to have paid $200k apiece to obtain franchises. Meanwhile, Automotive News [sub] notes
The statement by Mahindra hangs a question mark over the 300 to 350 U.S. retailers who have signed franchise agreements directly with Global Vehicles, if the Alpharetta, Ga., company no longer is the distributor.
Nor is it clear that Mahindra has the power to terminate the agreement without a court fight.
The core consumers would be interested in technology and kind of early adopters
Coda Automotive senior VP for sales and distribution Mike Jackson (yes, the former GM marketing whiz) describes the market for his firm’s forthcoming electric car. So what is Jackson’s “kind-of-early-adopter” Californian consumer looking to get out of the Coda? A redesigned Mitsubishi platform, built and bodied in China for one thing. Chinese lithium-ion batteries delivering “90-120” miles of range, and guaranteed for eight years or 100k miles (3 years, or 36k miles for everything else) for another. 134 HP and 221 lb-ft, good for a top speed of 80 MPH. An 8-inch navigation screen with real-time traffic updates. And for you, they’ll throw in 17-inch alloy wheels. But the Coda EV’s most striking feature (at least in terms of appealing to tech-oriented Californians) is best summed up in the measured prose of AutoWeek
It has fairly bland, universal styling and is roughly the size of a Chevrolet Cobalt.
Some of the world’s biggest automakers are relying on continued strong growth in the Chinese market in the face of sluggish US and European sales, but those plans are facing a challenge as Chinese sales have slowed this summer. Total vehicle sales grew 14.4 percent over July 2009 levels last month (sales grew 70 percent year-over-year in July 2009), the lowest rate of growth the Chinese car market has seen since March of last year. China’s government is doing its part, instituting a $443 subsidy for cars with 1.6 liters displacement or less in the beginning of July. But that doesn’t seem to be helping much, as the percentage of cars with 1.6 liter engines or smaller actually declined last month. What’s a growth-addicted automaker to do (besides slash prices)? The same thing they do in every other market: extend credit in hopes of boosting sales and upselling customers on more expensive cars.
Wrangler went on a summer tear last month, more than doubling its July 2009 number, and leading SUVs to a strong rally. The segment’s top 18 nameplates all improved their year-over-year numbers last month, as gas prices look to hold steady through the summer (only the Suzuki Grand Vitara lost ground). SUVs should be way up again (year-on-year) this month as well, as Cash For Clunkers limited SUV sales in August 2009. Strong sales in this segment could continue into the fall on the strength of new launches like the Jeep Grand Cherokee, and Ford Explorer. On the other hand, with the Explorer moving to a Crossover platform and lines between SUVs and CUVs generally blurring, it’s becoming increasingly important to compare mid/large CUVs against this SUV segment. Based on that comparison, it’s easy to see that the mass market tends to pick road-oriented people-haulers rather than offroad-oriented rock crawlers. SUVs may be booming this summer, but in the big picture they’re melting away into the ever-expanding Crossover category. Hit the jump for a bonus graph of Luxury-brand SUV/CUV sales in July.
In July, smaller cars accounted for only 65.38 percent of overall passenger vehicle sales, which totaled 946,200 units, declining 1.42 percentage points month-on-month and dropping below last year’s average of 69.5 percent for five months in a row.
“Small cars,” it should be pointed out, means cars with 1.6 liters displacement or less. This despite a 3,000 yuan ($443.37) government subsidy on 71 qualifying “small car” nameplates. And if an uncooperative market weren’t enough to cause some head-wagging in Beijing, only one Chinese-brand car made the China Association of Auto Manufacturers “ten best-selling sedans” list: the BYD F3. And no, not the plug-in hybrid version.
Whatever you do, don’t talk about anything related to the car itself. Reference an obscure previous ad for the car instead. Also, if the car’s target market is young men, be sure to make the ad’s protagonist an elderly female. Finally, the concept must be strange enough to be totally unmemorable. Then sit back and watch as your over-the-hill muscle car doubles its volume and still doesn’t quite match the Mustang or Camaro’s volume. Success!
Today’s Detroit News has an interesting item on Ford’s D3/D4 platform strategy, based on the thesis that
The remade Taurus has emerged as a flagship for the Dearborn automaker, restoring luster to a nameplate that had become synonymous with “rental car,” and helping to revive an automaker that had become dependent on trucks and sport utility vehicles.
As Jack Baruth’s Capsule Review of the Ford Five Hundred shows, the D3 platform offers good space and comfort, and the recent update and return to the Taurus nameplate has been rewarded with steadily-increasing sales. And though the Taurus has fought back to become a Ford-brand flagship (likely at the expense of Mercury), its platform-mates have been consistent underperformers on the showroom floor. Flex has sold in the low 3k monthly range, while MKS and MKT have been thoroughly beaten in YTD sales by the Cadillac DTS and Escalade, themselves hardly the most competitive alternatives to the big Lincolns.
I recently attended a fancy-pants dinner held by Chrysler PR for some Houston-area bloggers. We were wined, dined and introduced to the 2011 Grand Cherokee. While free food and journalistic integrity are a tough combo to swallow, I found something entertaining and inherently blog worthy: the castrated 2011 Ford Explorer is in the new Grand Cherokee’s gunsight. Why? One of the SUV’s most famous nameplates is now a crossover, while another is still an SUV. But neither of them like being called names.
Collectively, the the Detroit Three have enjoyed precisely one market share turnaround in the last several years: Ford in 2009. This year, Detroit’s market share looks downright stagnant. Chrysler’s got a tiny bump going on, but Ford’s lost its fizz and GM is skidding bottom… at best. On the other hand, if this graph is just too gloomy for you, hit the jump for one of the first glimmers of (market share) hope for Detroit in years.
We’ve got a tight fight for the top spot again this month in the Mid/Large CUV segment. Traverse, Pilot, Edge, Outback and Sorento are all running between 9k and 10k monthly units, and between 50k and 65k YTD sales. All of these top-selling nameplates improved over their July 2009 numbers, but the flagging Highlander and Venza both fell back year-on-year, as did the Flex. Can Edge ride a mid-cycle refresh to the 2010 Mid/large CUV sales title? That could just depend on whether or not Chevrolet opens up more production capacity for its Traverse. Meanwhile, Ford’s Explorer and Jeep’s Grand Cherokee should start eating into this segment… which begs the question: should these two nameplates be migrated out of SUVs and into the burgeoning segment? While you ponder the answer, we’ll be preparing an July SUV sales chart for tomorrow.
BMW snagged the top spot last month, but Lexus and Mercedes are still battling for the top spot in year-to-date luxury brand sales. Lincoln and Mercury are running at less than half the rate of Buick and Cadillac, while Saab’s year-to-date number is nearly on par with its next-nearest rival Jaguar’s monthly number. Infiniti pulled ahead of Audi in YTD and monthly sales in July, as both brands prepare to overtake the canceled Mercury brand in the YTD sales race, and start chasing Acura. It continues to be a rowdy year for the luxury brands…
Via Slashdot comes the latest word in your vehicle’s vulnerability to hackers: Tire Pressure Monitoring Systems. According to Goodgearguide.com, researchers from Rutgers and the University of South Carolina have found that wireless communications between tire-mounted sensors and and on-board computers can be intercepted by hackers, resulting in the ability to track your movements. According to researchers,
If the sensor IDs were captured at roadside tracking points and stored in databases, third parties could infer or prove that the driver has visited potentially sensitive locations such as medical clinics, political meetings, or nightclubs… Such messages could also be forged. An attacker could flood the control unit with low pressure readings that would repeatedly set off the warning light, causing the driver to lose confidence in the sensor readings, the researchers contend. An attacker could also send nonsensical messages to the control unit, confusing or possibly even breaking the unit.
Researchers note that such attacks would be expensive and complicated to pull off, but that even a simple encryption algorithm would shut this latest window of opportunity for hacker attacks. Says Wenyuan Xu of the University of South Carolina
If no one mentions [such flaws], then they won’t bother with security… The consumer may be willing to pay few dollars to make their autos secure
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