General Motors upcoming IPO is attracting a lot of attention, not least from Chinese car manufacturer SAIC. A long time partner of the General, SAIC is looking to buy a significant portion of GM’s IPO, and with nearly $6 billion in cash reserves, the company is in a good position to do so. According to...
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Citroen is going to enter the large luxury car market with a production version of the Metropolis concept car. The Metropolis will likely be badged as a DS9, and be positioned as a flagship to the company’s DS range, which currently markets a line of premium hatchbacks in Europe. The Metropolis is unique in that...
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General Motors’ Chinese division is on track to outsell its American unit, a not entirely surprising development in light of the sheer enormity of China’s auto market. GM China has been bolstered by the strength of their two domestic nameplates, Baojun and Wulin (seen above), which are popular in export markets as well as in...
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The Chinese market has a series of peculiar tastes, the most well-known being their love of stretched mid-size sedans. While China gets cars like the BMW 7-Series, Mercedes-Benz S-Class and other full-size luxury cars, stretched versions of everything from the BMW 5-Series to the Skoda Superb come in long-wheelbase versions, ostensibly for budding executives who...
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PSA Peugeot Citroen is the first automaker to publicly stand up to the Chinese government’s proposed Green Car Plan. Recently an initial draft of a new piece of Chinese government legislation was leaked in which was revealed plans by the world’s largest auto market to strong arm international auotmakers into sharing their hybrid and electric...
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Bentley‘s new V8 powered variant of the Continental GT may get an Audi derived dual clutch gearbox. Engineers are apparently looking into solutions that will allow the Conti’s unibody structure to accept the Audi S-tronic transmission, which is sized differently than the ZF automatic used in the W12 car. While the V8 model is expected...
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Buick‘s upcoming Verano subcompact, a twin of the Chevrolet Cruze, will be built at GM’s Orion, Michigan plant alongside the upcoming Chevrolet Aveo. The announcement comes as part of GM revealing details of their $145 million investment in the plant, which is expected to retain 1,550 jobs as well. The Verano is currently for sale...
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A controversial Chinese government plan that would force foreign automakers to surrender their electric vehicle technology in exchange for being able to sell vehicles in the world’s largest auto-market is drawing the ire of automakers worldwide. China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology is currently writing up a 10-year plan designed to transform the country...
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Bouyed by strong sales in China, Rolls-Royce is set to expand their Ghost range of small(er) sedans – but the company is tight lipped on just what models will be part of the Ghost range. With RR making three Ghosts for every Phantom, it would be a safe bet to assume that the Ghost will...
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BMW‘s plan to become the number one automaker in China will include new models for the world’s most populous country, as well as a leasing program to make the luxury cars more affordable to a growing middle class. “We have a clear target: We want to become the strongest premium brand in China,” said CFO...
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Nissan has announced a new brand for the Chinese market, known as Venucia, or Qi Chen in Chinese. The cars will be developed, launched and sold in partnership of Dongfeng Nissan, the local arm of the Japanese automaker. “In the future, we aim to sell more than one million vehicles annually and the new brand...
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BMW has released a Jurassic Park-esque video of its new BMW M3 Tiger Edition. The video doesn’t show us much, other than that the marketing department in China has a little too much time and money on their hands. The Tiger Edition, as you all know by now, is an M3 designed to commemorate the...
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The BMW M3 Tiger Edition, aka the M3 for people who like Mixed Martial Arts and t-shirts with rhinestones, is only going to be launched in China, but that hasn’t stopped BMW from releasing a photo gallery of the car. The gallery shows a bunch of actors doing some “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”-style acrobatics, as...
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General Motors is hoping to expand their Opel nameplate beyond its traditional European markets to places like China, Australia, South America and other unspecified Asian countries. GM is hoping to leverage Opel’s premium brand image to expand its lineups in places where the General lacks a foothold in that market segment. Chevrolet (and Holden) are...
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Audi‘s diminutive A1 compact hatchback is proving to be such a hot product that the company has decided to sell the car “at short notice” in markets such as Asia. While Audi wants to focus on European markets first, the car will eventually be sold in Asia, with Audi deciding on a strategy for the...
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It’s the Year Of the Tiger in China, and BMW is commemorating the occasion with the M3 Tiger Edition. Featuring the Fire Orange exterior color that first debuted on the M3 GTS, also gets unique wheels and some blacked out body parts. The Tiger edition is strangely devoid of the carbon fiber roof panel seen...
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With markets like China, Brazil, India and former Soviet bloc countries becoming more prosperous, the demand for a low cost, bare bones car for the sake of personal transportation. Tata’s Nano, Renault’s Logan and all manner of Chinese upstart brands have been filling the void in these up and coming locales, and now Toyota wants...
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Geely has officially purchased Volvo, the iconic Swedish automaker, from Ford, in a rumored $1.8 billion transaction. As part of the deal, Ford will continue to supply powertrains and other components for an unspecified amount of time, while both companies have mutually agreed to safeguard each other’s intellectual property. Stefan Jacoby, formerly head of Volkswagen...
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China’s Ministry of Commerce and its National Development and Reform Commission has signed off on a deal that will let Chinese carmaker Geely to purchase Volvo from Ford for $1.8 billion. “We have received all approvals required from the central government,” Ning Shuyong a spokesman from Geely, told Reuters. “We are currently working on closing...
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As part of a world-wide recovery plan, Toyota vehicles will get a standard front end treatment designed to unify the global lineup of Toyota vehicles. The new move is dictated by head honcho Akio Toyota’s directive to make Toyota cars have more “emotional appeal”, although its hard to see how the company can inject that...
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Optimus Prime famously uttered “freedom is the right of all sentient beings”, but one of his fans, a 14 year old boy from China took the liberty of drinking gasoline in a quest to emulate his Autobot hero. The boy was apparently inspired to drink gasoline after seeing Optimus Prime on TV, and wishing to...
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A former GM employee and her husband have been indicted by a federal grand jury in Detroit in an industrial spying case. Ex-GM worker Shanshan Du and her husband Yu Qin are accused of photocopying thousands of documents relating to hybrid vehicle technology. Prosecutors allege that the couple attempted to pass the documents on to...
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The Ford Escape has been around for nearly a decade now, but it may live on even after it leaves the North American market. Reports say that Chinese automaker Jiangling will acquire the tooling for the first generation Ford Escape, which was sold in certain world markets as the Ford Maverick. The rumors have appeared...
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Consumers in China and the United States are fueling the fortunes of German luxury car makers like Mercedes-Benz, BMW and Audi. Buyers in both countries are going wild for the re-designed Mercedes-Benz E-Class, BMW 5 Series and Audi A8. “The Chinese appetite for German nameplates is absolutely bottomless,” Sascha Gommel, a Frankfurt-based analyst with Commerzbank...
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