Industry

Last week’s Geneva Motor Show saw Italian engineer and design legend Sergio Pininfarina inducted into the European Automotive Hall of Fame for his contribution to the auto industry. Pininfarina has been the acting chairman of the Carrozzeria Pininfarina design studio since his father...

Indian giant Tata is on the verge of finalizing its takeover of Jaguar and Land Rover and now its Chief Ratan Tata has hinted that his next acquisition could be a stake in Ferrari. Tata is already heavily involved with Ferrari’s parent company Fiat, joining the Italian carmaker’s board...

Updated: Latest reports are claiming Tata is seeking $3 billion dollars in loans to acquire the Jaguar and Land Rover brands. The information comes from people close to deal, who told Bloomberg Tata has contacted investment banks Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase about securing the loan. Ford...

Ford has confirmed it won’t be selling Volvo anytime soon but that doesn’t mean it will be heavily involved in the day-to-day running of the company. Instead, the Blue Oval is expected to play a more limited role in Volvo’s future with officials currently developing a new business...

Some might argue the Jaguar brand has already done serious damage to itself under Ford's tenure as owner. Land Rover's most recent decade hasn't been nearly as off-putting as the leaping cat's but neither has it been especially memorable. With new concepts and production models just around the...

Oil prices have come down from their latest overnight record of $103 thanks to the greenback recovering some of the ground it lost and military incursions in Turkey and Northern Iraq easing tensions a little. Since February there has been an almost 20% rise in oil prices, mainly due to the weak U.S...

Influential magazine Consumer Reports has come out with this year’s ‘Top Picks’ comparo, picking the best cars from ten different categories in a field that included over 260 vehicles. For the first time ever, a South Korean manufacturer has been included as a top pick - Hyundai...

BMW arguably builds some of the finest engines in the industry but the carmaker isn’t one to prevent other makes from using its powerplants. Only last week Citroen announced plans to use BMW engines in some of its cars and soon GM and Fiat could be doing the same. Both GM and Fiat are...

Honda CEO Takeo Fukui has stated unequivocally that there is no recession in the US auto industry. Just days ago Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn told journalists in Seoul that the US automobile industry is in recession, and high material costs were a major factor. The differing opinions between Honda and...

Although the two car makers share very little in common, either in product line or market position, both GM and BMW have announced cutbacks in their European ranks today. For GM, outsourcing over 5,000 jobs could help the company meet budgetary goals. BMW is likewise seeking to eliminate 5,600 jobs...

The rejuvenated Fiat 500 Cinquecento has proven so popular that demand has been outstripping supply for the first six months of sales, and with a host of new models on the way and no sign of demand slowing officials have been forced to boost production to 190,000 units a year. Fiat originally...

Tata’s groundbreaking Nano minicar has garnered much of the world’s attention because of its extremely low price tag (just $2,500), but it also managed to capture the attention of a number of mainstream carmakers who hope to use it as a model to develop ultra-cheap cars of their own...

Carmakers are already fretting at the thought of achieving the new 35mpg CAFE standards imposed by the U.S. government, so imagine how they would feel if faced with a much stricter 44mpg being considered by California regulators. Officials are looking at raising restrictions over the next decade...

Only a couple of years ago a hydrogen future was all the rage with both car companies and lawmakers alike but in more recent times we’ve seen many of the same supporters back away from the clean fuel. We saw dozens of hydrogen powered fuel-cell concept cars rolled out at car shows around the...

Indian automotive giant Tata Motors met with unions from both Jaguar and Land Rover earlier this month to discuss the planned takeover of the British marques, which Ford is expected to finally confirm within the next couple of weeks. During the early bidding phase, Tata quickly became a favorite of...

The U.S. government has already voted in favour of forcing carmakers to lift their fleet average fuel consumption figure to 35mpg by 2020 but what the feds didn’t outline was what interim fuel economy targets will come into effect in the meantime. This uncertainly forced a number of carmakers...

Several major carmakers, most notably GM, and farming industries alike are touting ethanol as the solution to curb the world’s dependence on fossil fuels and reduce greenhouse gasses but the facts show that ethanol is actually worse than the stuff that comes out of the ground. A new report...

Jaguar's impending XF sedan can't come soon enough with the Ford owned manufacturer reporting a 19 percent drop in worldwide sales for 2007. Conversely, its sister company, Land Rover, reported an increase in global sales of 18 percent. Both companies are still owned by Ford until the deal to sell...

Growth isn’t always achieved by getting bigger. Sometimes a company has to get smaller and more efficient to proceed, and Nissan has been taking that tack for the past several years. In doing so, it has shortened new model lead times, increased the return on every dollar spent and turned...

America’s three major carmakers may soon get the break they’ve been waiting for with news that employees paid just $14-an-hour will be joining the ranks in less than a year. All three brands - Chrysler, Ford and GM - are expected to hire about 36,000 hourly and salaried staff in...