Recently, upon arriving at home from the office around seven o’clock in the evening, I was informed that my sister had requested my presence as she wanted to show her newly bought service utility car. Without much ado, I immediately went to their place and noticed a black SUV park at their house premise which I came to know later on that was it. In the process, I’ve observed that at least the interior looks great, from what I know of the interior designer, just about every component will look and feel posh. But what impress me much is that it was fitted with an assortment of porsche cayenne custom floor mats for custom protection and comfort. In fact; without sounding too complimentary, based on the interior alone, I am astonished the price-tag is an attainable value.
Custom Protection & Comfort
Chrysler Hopes To Refinance, Pay Off Government Debt Ahead Of Initial Public Stock Offering
Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne says the company will try to refinance its government loans this year as it prepares for an initial public stock offering.
He says the company can post a net profit for the first time since emerging from bankruptcy protection if it gets more favorable financing terms.
Chrysler owes the U.S. government $5.8 billion and the Canadian government $1.6 billion. The money is part of a $12.5 billion loan package that funded Chrysler’s bankruptcy in 2009. [Read more...]
Vehicle Sales Up 27% in 2010; Toyota Keeps Lead
Sales of motor vehicles increased 27.2 percent in 2010 to 168,490 units, demolishing the previously set record of 162,000 units in sales in 1996 and giving the industry reason to be bullish this year.
According to documents from the Chamber of Automotive Manufacturers of the Philippines Inc. (Campi) and the Truck Manufacturers Association, the number of vehicles sold in December 2010 alone came up to 13,749 units, a 1.1-percent improvement from the 13,596 units sold in the same month the year before.
Total commercial vehicle sales last year were placed at 109,799 units, growing 27.4 percent from 2009’s 86,216 units. This segment accounted for 65.2 percent of overall sales.
The light commercial vehicle sub-segment—composed of pickup trucks, vans, compact wagons and full-size sports utility vehicles—accounted for the bulk of commercial vehicle sales during the period at 69,754 units in 2010, up 32.3 percent from the 52,708 units registered the year before. [Read more...]
In 2011, Cars To Come With Star Ratings On Energy Efficiency
Car owners in India will come to know, probably from 2011, how eco-friendly their vehicle is. The government is coming up with star labelling for the automobile sector in order to stipulate strict fuel efficiency norms for cars.
The Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE), a statutory body under the power ministry, along with the Ministry of Road and Surface Transport has finalised Corporate Average Fuel Efficiency — where the fuel economy of an entire fleet of a car manufacturing company is measured.
“There is a fair degree of movement on standards and labelling for automobiles and the principles on which this will be done have been largely agreed to. So I presume that very soon we should be able to announce the standards and labelling programmes for automobiles,” BEE Director General Ajay Mathur told IANS. [Read more...]
Carmakers Find Strength In Partnerships
Carmakers clawing back ground after a damaging crisis are increasingly pledging to deepen existing alliances and are looking for new partners to save costs and access new markets.
Here are some of the partnerships and plans announced as carmakers prepared for the Paris Auto Show, which opens to the media on Thursday and the public on Saturday.
VOLKSWAGEN/ALFA ROMEO
Volkswagen Chairman Ferdinand Piech has set his sights on Fiat’s Alfa Romeo brand as a thirteenth brand in his vast automotive empire. Fiat has officially denied any interest in selling. [Read more...]
More Sops For Green Cars
The city of Shenzhen began offering subsidies for new-energy vehicles on Tuesday, as part of broader national program to encourage fuel-efficiency.
Under the terms of the new regional subsidy plan, plug-in hybrid car makers can qualify for up to 30,000 yuan ($4,412) subsidy for each sale and wholly electric car makers can qualify for up to 60,000 yuan per unit sold, said Shenzhen Mayor Xu Qin on Tuesday.
Private car buyers in the city can qualify for a subsidy of 9,000 yuan for the purchase of an energy-efficient car.
Electric carmaker BYD Co, a key beneficiary of the extra government subsidy program, saw its shares gain 5.91 percent to HK$60 on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange on Tuesday. [Read more...]
Energy-Saving Cars In The Spotlight
Opel has displayed early versions of its Ampera hybrid vehicle at other auto shows, but this time, for the Geneva show, a top executive at General Motors’ Opel/Vauxhall unit drove it from Germany.
The message of the 348-mile road trip by the executive, Gherardo Corsini, who heads the electric vehicle project, was straightforward _ the car works.
“Getting lots of curious looks at the rest area,” one of Mr. Corsini’s passengers, Dietmar Thate, manager of social media for Opel, said via Twitter after the car made a short stop on Sunday.
The hybrid car is meant to run on batteries for about 60 km before a gasoline-powered generator kicks in for longer trips.
One of the big themes of the Geneva International Motor Show, which opens to the news media on Tuesday and to the public on Thursday through March 14, is that electric-powered vehicles are moving inexorably from prototypes to actual production — whether or not the buying public is ready.
“The time is past when companies only displayed studies,” said Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer, director of the Centre for Automotive Research at the University of Duisburg-Essen in Duisburg, Germany. “Now the industry is moving toward hard facts.”
Governments around the world, eager to do something about global warming, have been pushing automakers in that direction.
But the shift toward electric vehicles also represents a huge leap of faith for the automakers, especially as they emerge from a devastating downturn. To be able to produce electric cars in a few years, they must invest billions now without knowing how large the market will be.
In addition, there is no consensus on what kind of technology will prevail. The possibilities include pure battery power, some combination of batteries and internal combustion engines and more exotic solutions like hydrogen fuel cells.
“Right now, car companies don’t quite know what technology to bet on,” said Peter Wells, co-director of the Centre for Automotive Industry Research at Cardiff University in Wales. “It’s probably not safe to bet on just one.”
Opel, which is trying to regain market share in Europe from Volkswagen and Ford, is scheduled to start commercial production of the Ampera — a cousin of the Chevrolet Volt — near the end of next year. BMW said last week that it would produce an electric vehicle made partly with lightweight carbon fibre at its existing plant in Leipzig, with market introduction no later than 2015.
Toyota, still struggling to repair a reputation battered by reports of sudden acceleration and other problems in its vehicles, is scheduled to show the latest prototype of its plug-in Prius hybrid in Geneva. The car will be able to travel 25 km solely on battery power and is expected to hit the market in 2011.
Some industry experts say all-electric vehicles present an opportunity to create a new market among well-heeled, environmentally conscious buyers.
“Interesting customer segments are waiting desperately in some cases for these products,” said Gregor Matthies, a partner at the consultant Bain & Co. in Munich.
In November, Daimler began producing small numbers of battery-powered versions of its two-seat Smart car in Hambach, France. The company has said it plans to produce 20,000 a year, beginning in 2012.
Mitsubishi’s MiEV, already in Japanese showrooms, is scheduled to be available in Europe later this year. Nissan plans to introduce its Leaf in the United States, Europe and Japan in December.
Even the makers of sports cars, bastions of internal combustion, are tentatively moving toward electric power. By Jack Ewing, New York Times News Service