Today’s White House blog post documents the revival and resurgence of the American auto industry that was once believed to be on the verge of extinction. The whole story is explained in the following three simple gifs.
Image courtesy: Whitehouse.gov
Image Courtesy: Whitehouse.gov
Image Courtesy: Whitehouse.gov
(Source: Jalopnik)
Too bad the cops just left before the fury from hell was unleashed on that poor Cadillac Deville.. There is no stopping this one mad woman who is hell bent on taking it all out.. I’m assuming the man identified as the “bitch ass punk” seen lurking in the background is the party responsible for this outburst.. He did the best thing anyone could have asked for in such a domestic situation without getting hurt.. He stayed the hell away from her and did not take a chance of stopping her from doing what she needed to cool herself.. Damn!
Thank you, Jalopnik for delivering such gems! And as sadistic as this sounds, I liked the music in the background, which Jalopnik identified as the jilted woman vandal anthem sung by Jazmine Sullivan
(Source: Studydriving.com via Infographlove)
Interestingly, the infographic below summarizes the data into this nugget: Americans make better cars than Japanese. No wonder GM and Ford are making a comeback. After all, this country love a good comeback.
(Source: New York Times)
Image Courtesy: Ali Samandarian via New York Times
Today’s New York Times carried this nice article about a small but thriving group of classic car enthusiasts in Iran .
…The setting was a gathering of the Tehran Café Racers, but aside from a few minor details — Persian lettering on the license plates and on the cans of Coke sipped over lunch — it could have taken place at any number of racetracks in America. The loose-knit group, an affiliate of a club based in Florida, is part of Iran’s enthusiastic classic car culture. Vintage Detroit models play a big role in the activities, and driving events take precedence — the track session was the group’s first since its founding earlier this year.
“I was expecting a better turnout for the American car contingent,” Ramin Salehkhou, a 44-year-old American-educated lawyer who started the Tehran branch of the club, wrote in an e-mail. “But three of the guys, owners of a 1968 Dodge Charger, a 1970 Ford Mustang Mach 1 and a 1978 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am, had to bail out.”
A rare high-performance Camaro belonging to Mr. Salehkhou is at the core of the Tehran group’s formation, and Detroit was well represented among the 30 cars at the track. American cars usually account for 30 to 40 percent of participants at club gatherings, he said.
….Last month, a classic-car rally in the ancient city of Isfahan attracted a variety of American vehicles, including Chevy sedans from the ’50s and ’60s as well as some Camaros and Pontiac Firebirds.
Click here to read the entire article
Transportgooru Musings: Post-revolutionary Iran would be the last place I’d expect to have a classic car culture, especially featuring some classic american icons like the Chevy Camero and Mustang. Hopefully this comes to grow and capture the minds and hearts of more Iranians. After all, love for cars has no boundary and national identity. Can the muscle cars of Detroit achieve what diplomacy and multi-party talks couldn’t achieve – winning the hearts and minds of Iranians and their rulers? Time will tell.
For Detroit residents who get power from DTE, the Michigan Public Service Commission announced this week that it has approved the state’s first experimental rate for residential customers to recharge their electric vehicles.
DTE will offer two rates, a low, off-peak rate to charge plug-in vehicles overnight or a monthly flat rate of $40 per vehicle (how will they identify a single vehicle, though?). Also, DTE will pay up to $2,500 for customers to get a “separately metered circuit with a charging station” installed or just pay for a station’s installation. MPSC approved the rate to let DTE see how plug-in vehicles will impact its grid. The experimental rate goes through the end of 2012 and will be available to the first 2,500 customers who sign up.
Read more at green.autoblog.com
Business Week’s David Welch throws a lot of interesting arguments about the Government’s decision when things looked ominous for the auto industry a year ago.
President Obama served up red meat for his hard-core supporters in Detroit yesterday, proclaiming that the government’s bailout of General Motors and Chrysler to be a success. Had he not intervened and invested in the two companies, Obama said, they would have fallen into liquidation and 1.1 million jobs would have evaporated. In the past year, the auto industry has regained 55,000 of the 334,000 jobs lost, he went on. “The fact that we’re standing in this magnificent factory today is a testament to the decisions we made,” Obama said while visiting Chrysler’s Jeep Grand Cherokee plant in Detroit. His comments were aimed clearly at the critics on the other side of the political aisle who opposed the bailout 18 months ago and who still criticize government ownership of GM and Chrysler to this day.
So far, it is tough to argue that the bailout hasn’t worked. GM is in the black, having reported an $865 million profit in the first quarter with black ink looking likely for the rest of the year. GM’s results are strong enough that the company is preparing for an initial public offering that should start selling stock in November. Chrysler is at least making an operating profit, which puts the company in much better shape than most analysts thought it would be a year ago. With much lower costs, both companies should be able to make money going forward. Let’s not forget that GM, Chrysler and cross-town rival Ford cut out 2.9 million cars worth of production capacity during the crisis, according to the Center for Automotive Research. That was a quarter of capacity in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. Cutting out the fat has allowed them to post profits even though sales are slow.
(Sources: Detroit News, Detroit Free press)
After pulling over a reportedly stolen car early Wednesday morning, police discovered that the driver, Renee Lashon Beavers, 33, of Detroit, had been issued 45 license suspensions from the Michigan Secretary of State.
Image Courtesy: Detroit Free Press - Photo of Renee Lashon Beavers
“Actually, she has never had a driver’s license from us,” said SOS spokesman Fred Woodhams. “She definitely has a record with us, but we show that she’s never had a license.”
Renee Lashon Beavers had an open 24-ounce container of cold beer on her lap when a Ferndale police officer spotted the stolen car eastbound on 8 Mile near Livernois just after midnight, Lt. William Wilson said today.
She told investigators she bought the green 1999 Dodge Stratus from another woman at a shelter in Adrian for $1,000. And she took it anyway after the woman demanded another $400, she told police, Wilson said.
Beavers’ record with the SOS stretches back to 1999 and has been cited at least 45 times over the last 10 years in Highland Park, Southfield and Detroit for a wide range of traffic violations — driving under the influence of liquor, driving without license or insurance, failure to use seat belts, careless driving, failure to obey a traffic device, violation of child restraint laws and more — but was never was arrested until this week, according to a Michigan Secretary of State spokesman.
Police plan to charge her with driving with a suspended license and with an open container of alcohol in a vehicle.
Click here to read the entire article.
(Source: Business Week & WSJ)
Ford Motor Co. is upping its production of fuel efficient vehicles in the third quarter to meet demand, the company, says for vehicles being purchased under the extended Cash for Clunkers program, as well as overall increased interest in new cars by consumers.
Cash for Clunkers is pushing August sales so far this month to levels not seen since before the global credit meltdown last Fall. In the first few days of August, Edmunds.com says the auto industry was cracking at a 16 million a year rate. That’s up from less than a 10 million selling rate in the first half of the year, and less than 12 million rate in July.
Ford increased its third-quarter production to 495,000 new vehicles, driven primarily by the demand for its Focus and Escape models. The company will build 6,000 more Focus vehicles during the quarter through overtime and Saturday shifts.
Ford senior sales analyst George Pipas says that it is too early to project the selling rate for August on the whole. “But I can tell you that retail sales we are seeing is eyepopping versus a year ago.”
Ford’s chief economist Ellen Hughes-Cromwick said the clunkers program could generate as much as 750,000 in new vehicle sales for the industry and is now on pace to run out of money within the next three weeks.
“This is what fiscal stimulus is suppose to do when you are in the financial situation we were in,” Hughes-Cromwick said.
Ford’s European executives said Wednesday they are holding formal talks with different governments to continue similar clunkers programs which are boosting sales in such countries as Germany. Russia, which is in a deep economic slump, also said Wednesday it too will start a scrappage offer.
Ford will build 10,000 more Focus sub-compact cars and Escape crossover SUVs than it had planned. In July, the first month of the government’s Clunkers program, the Focus was the top model purchased with the help of government rebates, while the Escape was the only utility vehicle to make the top ten.
Ford is increasing its North American production to a total of 495,000 units in the third quarter, an increase of 18% from the same quarter in 2008. Ford also plans to produce 570,000 vehicles in the fourth quarter, a 33% boost from the same quarter last year and 15% above planned third-quarter output.
The increased production will come after the Clunkers program has run out of money, but Ford says it will need it to replenish depleted inventories and deal with increasing demand for more fuel efficient vehicles as consumers anticipate higher gas prices with a recovering economy.
Click here to read the entire article.
(Source: Detroit News via Autoblog & Bloomberg)
Image Courtesy: Apture - Ford Focus
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has processed 80,500 transactions so far, and the early winner of Cash For Clunkers appears to be the Ford Focus. The Detroit News is reporting that the Focus is the number one vehicle purchased under the government program, showing us why Ford’s C-Segment vehicle gained 43.6% in July. Ford also saw an amazing 97% increase in Escape sales in July, a tally that was likely improved with the help of Cash For Clunkers.
The controversial and somewhat clumsy program is drawing plenty of attention for its popularity amongst car buyers, and Detroit automakers appear to be taking more than their fair share of sales.
The White House says 47% of all vehicles sold through the bill so far come from US automakers; 2% higher than the domestics’ 45% overall share. Four of the top 10 vehicles purchased under the program come from domestic automakers, and over half of all vehicles were built in the States.
This wildly popular program is currently all but spent and is awaiting the Senate nod for a further $2Billion cash infusion to keep it going. On Friday, the House approved the $2 billion increase. The Senate is expected to vote Wednesday or Thursday; the White House is pressing it to act. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told MSNBC that the program has been a “lifeline to the economy.”
To drum up support for more dollars, the White House is touting the program’s value. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs says the average fuel economy increase so far is 9.4 mpg; a 61% increase verses the vehicles destined for a sodium silicate bath. So far, 83% of the vehicles traded in have been trucks, while 60% of the vehicles purchased under the program have been cars. The White House estimates that Cash For Clunkers will save the average car buyer $700 – $1,000 in gas prices during the life of the vehicle.
The sales last month from the federal incentives may result in fewer buyers later this year after the program ends, George Pipas, Ford’s sales analyst, told CNBC today.
A similar program in Germany won’t sustain sales growth into 2010 as those incentives expire, said Matthias Wissmann, president of the German carmakers, today at a Frankfurt news conference. Germany’s car market expanded by 26 percent from a year earlier in the first half, propelled by increases of at least 40 percent in May and June.
Our favorite auto website, Jalopnik, offers a comprehensive list of the top 10 vehicles sold and trade-ins) dealt under this CARS program.
The Ten Most Traded-In Vehicles (vehicle’s EPA mileage)
1. 1998 Ford Explorer (14-17 mpg)
2. 1997 Ford Explorer (14-18 mpg)
3. 1996 Ford Explorer (14-18 mpg)
4. 1999 Ford Explorer (14-18 mpg)
5. Jeep Grand Cherokee
6. Jeep Cherokee
7. 1995 Ford Explorer (15-18 mpg)
8. 1994 Ford Explorer (15-18 mpg)
9. 1997 Ford Windstar (18 mpg)
10. 1999 Dodge Caravan (16-18 mpg)
The Ten Most Purchased Vehicles (vehicle’s EPA mileage)
1. Ford Focus (27-28 mpg)
2. Honda Civic (24-42 mpg)
3. Toyota Corolla (25-30 mpg)
4. Toyota Prius (46 mpg)
5. Ford Escape (20-32 mpg)
6. Toyota Camry (23-34 mpg)
7. Dodge Caliber (22-27 mpg)
8. Hyundai Elantra (26-28 mpg)
9. Honda Fit (29-31 mpg)
10. Chevy Cobalt (25-30 mpg
Click here to read the entire article.
(Source: Dow Jones via Wall Street Journal & LeftLane News.com, WTOP)
Italy’s Fiat is the new owner of most of Chrysler’s assets, closing a deal Wednesday that saves the troubled U.S. automaker from liquidation and places a new company in the hands of Fiat’s CEO. The deal creates a leaner company known as Chrysler Group LLC, which is not in bankruptcy protection and is free of billions in debt, 789 underperforming dealerships and burdensome labor costs that hobbled the old Chrysler LLC. The future of Chrysler Group LLC began to take shape Wednesday as its new leadership announced sweeping management and organizational changes.
The announcements came as Chrysler merged its assets with Fiat SpA (FIATY), following a six-week bankruptcy process for the U.S. auto maker. The last hurdle to the sale of Chrysler assets to Fiat was cleared late Tuesday when the U.S. Supreme Court rejected creditors’ objections to the deal.
The completion of the Chrysler deal bolsters President Barack Obama’s administration, which guided Chrysler through bankruptcy and hopes that a concurrent restructuring at General Motors Corp. (GM), which filed for Chapter 11 on June 1, will also be completed quickly.
Chrysler confirmed that its new Chief Executive is Sergio Marchionne, who also serves as Fiat’s CEO. Marchionne replaces Robert Nardelli, who served as Chrysler’s chief for the past 20 months. As reported, Robert Kidder, the lead independent director at Morgan Stanley, will become chairman of Chrysler’s new board of directors. Current Vice Chairman Jim Press will be appointed deputy CEO and special advisor, the company said.
Marchionne said in a letter to Chrysler employees that the company will be more focused and nimble, benefiting significantly from its global alliance with the Italian auto maker. The new Chrysler Group LLC noted that it would soon reopen Chrysler factories that were idled during the bankruptcy process, costing the automaker $100 million per day.
Under the old Chrysler, the automaker’s three brands – Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep – were all vertically integrated. However, Fiat has now separate all parts of Chrysler—including its Mopar parts division – with executives heading up each division. The new setup largely mirrors Fiat’s management style with its Fiat, Alfa Romeoand Lancia brands.
“The new company moves forward with significant strategic advantages, including a healthy balance sheet, a competitive cost structure, a leaner and more efficient dealer network, sound supplier agreements and significantly improved product quality and operational efficiency,” he said in the letter.
Chrysler, the smallest of the three U.S. auto makers, sought emergency government aid and was forced to file for bankruptcy in recent months owing to a steep decline in sales that drained the company’s cash. Chrysler enters this new chapter of its storied history at a time when the outlook for the auto industry remains bleak, amid continued economic weakness and tight credit conditions. Jim Press – Chrysler’s former co-president – might have been questioning his decision to move from Toyota to Chrysler
in 2007 in recent weeks, but the automotive exec’s career is safe as Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne has named Press the deputy CEO of the reborn Chrysler.
Michael Manley, Michale Accavitti and Peter Fong, all of whom were previously with Chrysler, will run Jeep, Dodge and Chrysler, respectively. Pietro Gorlier, who joins Chrysler from Fiat, will head Mopar.
Chrysler’s swift passage through about six weeks of bankruptcy proceedings was helped by the involvement of the Obama administration’s auto task force, which provided billions in financing and helped negotiate a deal with the company’s stakeholders.
As part of the reorganization plan, the new Chrysler will be 20% owned by Fiat, while more than 55% will be controlled by the United Auto Workers union. Fiat’s stake could increase to 35% if the new company meets benchmarks intended to insure the development of fuel-efficient vehicles in the U.S., and it has the option to become the majority stakeholder once U.S. loans have been repaid. The U.S. and Canadian governments also have minority stakes.
The sale to Fiat SpA marks a victory for the Obama administration, which shepherded Chrysler LLC into Chapter 11 protection on April 30 with the hope that the company would emerge in a matter of months with a new partner.
“This morning’s closing represents a proud moment in Chrysler’s storied history,” said the Treasury Department in a written statement. “The Chrysler-Fiat Alliance has now exited the bankruptcy process and is poised to emerge as a competitive, viable automaker.”
The government will loan the new company $4.7 billion, to be repaid within eight years along with interest and $288 million in fees.
The Treasury had given Chrysler LLC $3.3 billion in debtor-in-possession financing to support the company throughout the bankruptcy process. Chrysler LLC remains in bankruptcy court, as it winds down operations, selling plants it doesn’t want, dispersing payments to debtholders and settling any other claims that were not transferred to the new company. Those actions could linger until next year, if not longer.
