Following the approved $25 billion in loans to help U.S. based auto groups, Europe’s car makers plan to ask the European Commission for a €40 billion ($55.22 billion) loan. European car makers plan to use the loan to aide them toward meeting the 2012 EU mandate that calls for the automakers to lower carbon dioxide emissions. If America will give the money, why can’t the EU? After all, it will be used to accelerate the transition to environmentally friendly cars.
According to a spokesman for the automaker, "All European car makers agree on the [€40 billion] demand." Shocking.
In a time when big cars seem to be out of fashion, it seems one company is looking to begin making its own large sedan for a very exclusive list of clients. How exclusive? Unless your name is Uncle Sam, you can’t get one.
Carbon Motors is introducing a model called the E7 that will be sold exclusively to law enforcement agencies. Although this concept has been around for about a year, it looks like the car is getting closer to production. While the company is still looking for investors, a prototype will begin touring the country later this month.
Part of why Carbon Motors wants to start this program is so they can buy back the cars and recycle them. “Today the criminal element is buying these cars because they still look like police cars,” said William Santana Li, CEO of Carbon Motors Corp. By taking them back, Carbon will have better control of where police and government agency cars end their life.
Although Carbon Motors will likely be taking sales away from the Detroit manufactures, Carbon says it has a good relationship with the auto manufacturers and will likely rely on them for engines. Carbon claims that the volume for these cars are about 10,000 to 80,000 per year, and that some of the major manufactures are happy to have Carbon focus on the lower-profit niche market of law enforcement vehicles. If all goes right, the E7 should be on the streets and bustin’ heads by 2012.
How do you chase down speeders in a country full of Ferraris? Hemi power, of course! Kuwait’s Ministry of Interior purchased 150 Dodge Chargers with police packages to use for traffic, security and emergency response. Deputy Ministry of Kuwait’s Interior, Musaed S. Al-Guwainem said that the Charges were chosen for the police because, "speed, handling and functionality are critical to their job.” Now all Dodge has to do is teach the entire Kuwaiti police force how to yell ‘Yee-Haw’ whenever they get in ‘hot pursuit’.
Who knew the Government were such a bunch of car nuts? The government fleet includes 642,233 owned or leased sedans, SUVs, trucks, limousines and ambulances for over three dozen government agencies. According to the General Services Administration data, the operation of the vehicles (maintenance, leases and fuel) cost tax payers $3.4 billion last year. The government feels they need the cars to operate, while watchdogs feel differently stating that there is a lot of wasteful spending. For instance the driver for Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt earns about $90,000 a year. Government drivers salaries start at $46,000 a year. Many agencies also have cars that are rarely used, being driven once every few months, and the VA had a car disappear several months ago.
Oh and one last fact, none of this includes the Congress’ fleet of cars. Congress does not need to report their annual fleet cost and inventory to the General Services Administration.
A year ago Paris’s mayor, Bertrand Delanoë began a successful citywide bike sharing program named Velib’. Anyone in the French city could rent a bike from one of 5,000 different locations, ride to their destination, and drop it off. Convenient, cheap, and the Parisians loved it. Now the Mayor is offering a new idea, same concept but with fully electric cars.
The idea, named Autolib’, is to start off with 2,000 electric cars in Paris. When a Parisian needs a car they can rent one from 700 planned lots, both above and bellow ground, and pay only for the time spent behind the wheel. The lots are planned to allow 24 hr access to the cars with no advanced booking needed. There is also talk of another 2,000 cars in the suburbs of Paris.
With gas prices rising and city parking being somewhat impossible, many drivers are delighted by the idea. Only 43 percent of Paris households have vehicles and 95 per cent of them are parked at any moment. The idea behind AutoLib’ is to help lure people away from the feeling that they need to buy a car by offering them a cheap and eco-friendly alternative.
Iraq needs rebuilding, and Mercedes will be there. No matter your political view, it’s obvious the country could use more infrastructure. Daimler, the parent company of Mercedes, announced today that it is making an investment in Iraq, with special emphasis on trucks and busses. The company is working with the government to find out what Iraq needs, and what they can afford. Daimler has already been in Iraq since February laying the groundwork for this by setting up a training center to provide service for the influx of Daimler products. Mercedes has a history in playing a dual role in serving the Middle East. While small-engined versions of the diesel E-class serve as workhorse taxis, the S-Class chauffeurs the more affluent members.
Last week, we brought you news about the Chinese counterpart of the BMW X5 and how the German court banned the maker from selling it in Germany. For those who thought the escapade was over, wait till you hear this.
A German court in Munich has slotted into top gear and ordered Shuanghuan to destroy all their SUVs plying German roads. Making matters worse is the court’s notice to importers, China Automobile, to pay compensatory damages to BMW.
BMW as expected is overjoyed with the court’s verdict which was imminent when BMW’s spokesperson stated that "We are pleased that the court has agreed with our views”
The not so happy Karl Schloessl of China Automobile Germany, said he would launch an appeal against the ruling, which is not yet binding, saying he was prepared to take the case to the European Court of Justice.
It was impossible to ban a vehicle in Germany that was allowed to be on the road in the rest of Europe, Schloessl said, adding that there were more than a 1,000 of them on the road in Italy.
This news serves as a slap on the face of Chinese automakers as a whole. If further verdicts support BMW which I think will, there would be no other choice for Shuanghuan other than plucking its SUVs off German roads and sending them to the crushers. With that said, Chinese automakers will be forced to think twice before bringing their copy cars to Germany again.
Chinese cars are cheap to buy, and some don’t have a good reputation for being safe or hot cakes in developed markets. Above all that, the majority resemble BMW’s, Audi’s and Mercedes’ designs.
Glance at the car pictured above. If I were to strip off its badge and park it alongside a previous generation BMW X5, would you be able to tell them apart? I’m very optimistic that you wouldn’t. One can argue that cars today are somewhat similarly designed, headlamps, tail lamps, and quarter glass panels are carried over from one model to another, but definitely not entire cars.
BMW had taken legal action against Shuanghuan by filing a case in a German court in September last year, for making the CEO (Pictured) based on their X5 SUV. The case now has come to an end, BMW emerging victorious in the battle, as the court ruled that Shuanghuan’s CEO infringes BMW’s design rights.
Furthermore, the court announced that Shuanghuan is banned from selling their CEO in Germany.
But Managing Director Karl Schloessl is not happy about the verdict. He complains that the CEO is an entirely different car compared to the X5. He plans to fight again by appealing against the court’s decision.
’It is a one-sided judgment, but of course it was made in Munich. It’s a BMW city," expressed the unhappy director on the court’s verdict.
On today’s TopGear blog, Andy Wilman, the executive producer of Top Gear, is telling us that Clarkson was bluffing when he told some "socialist hippies at a book festival" that he scored a 186 mph on public roads with the Veyron: "Now the thing is, you’d need a frigging Tardis to do 186 mph in the Limehouse Link". For those of you speaking proper US English, it means that it is impossible. We think it is very possible as the tunnel is 1.1 mile and the Veyron can reach the quarter mile in 10.2 seconds at 143 mph.
Anyways, Mr Wilman now blames everybody for harassing Jeremy, aka Jezza. "we’re in danger of becoming a country where it’s a crime to be fatuous, to make mischief or just practice the fine art of talking bollocks." said the producer.
So who got the biggest ’bollocks’, Jeremy or his producer, who’s trying to convince us that Jeremy cannot push the Bugatti to 186mph under one mile :)
Post a comment
Picture Gallery
RSS -
Webmaster free news |