We’re hoping that we’ve seen the worst out of this global economic crisis. After all, the entire auto industry seems to have suffered enough, don’t you think?
But you can’t say that the economic woes have put a leash on people’s interest in the Rolls Royce Ghost.
According to Tom Purves, Rolls Royce’s CEO, the 2010 Ghost has generated over 1,200 interested customers – a surprising number even for the standards of Rolls Royce’s ‘mini-Phantom’ sedan.
It’s easy to see why Rolls Royce is ecstatic over the interest the Ghost is generating considering the recession is far from finished. But then again, in a time like this, good news becomes great news and great news becomes ecstatic celebrations.
While Purves acknowledges that the general level of interest for the Ghost is more than what they expected, the company nevertheless remains cautiously optimistic, that they can build on car’s strong reception.
"We’re not convinced we’re out of this recession yet," he says. "We know what we’re going to build in the next three months, then we’ll take it quarter by quarter from there."
In any event, Rolls Royce is expected to make around 2000 Ghost models per year and if the interest for the car is any indication, we’re thinking that we’ll be seeing a lot of Ghosts our on the road soon.
We’re taking a break from all the hoopla surrounding the Frankfurt Motor Show to give some bit of good news to all Audi enthusiasts in America.
Boys and girls, the Audi A1 is headed to the US.
That news comes according to Peter Schwarzenbauer, head of Audi’s sales division. The decision to bring the A1 to the US came as a result of the company’s intent to give the MINI some stiff competition in the American market. Incidentally, MINI is owned by BMW – Audi’s local rival in Germany – so it was pretty much easy to put two and two together.
If you don’t know, Audi has set its sights on global auto domination by 2015 so its staking all efforts in ensuring that it surpasses heated rivals BMW and Mercedes in all the important global auto markets, the biggest of which, is, of course, the US.
Truth be told, Audi has a tall order in front of it if it wants to overcome Mercedes and BMW in America, especially when you consider the strong market hold BMW has in the US.
But then again, you don’t get to the top without having to work for it; so you can expect that the Audi A1 won’t be the last Audi to be released in the US in the coming future.
BMW’s exit from Formula One has paved the road for the return of one of its old racing teams, Lotus.
In announcement made by the FIA, the sanctioning body of Formula One said that the famous brand’s return to the F1 stage resulted in the empty slot vacated by BMW Sauber, despite the fact that Sauber is still interested in procuring a team of its own for the 2010 season.
While Sauber’s official application generating good reviews from the Paris-based federation, the team is optimistic that it can return to F1 as the 14th and final team in the grid.
For the record, the rulebooks only allow for a maximum of 13 teams and Sauber’s stature as ‘team no. 14’ is still subject to change, depending on how the other teams are open to having 28 cars for next year.
As far as Lotus is concerned, the team has tied-up with a Malaysian F1 outfit – 1 Malaysia F1 Team – and will be powered by a Cosworth engine. The team’s principal is expected to be Tony Fernandes and joining him as technical director would be Mike Gascoyne.
For those who don’t know, Fernandes is the incumbent CEO of AirAsia, which, coincidentally, is a current sponsor of the Williams team.
Sometimes, patience does pay off in the end. After years of waiting, all of us can now giddy-up in excitement after hearing news that Mazda is now set to bring the Mazda 2 in North America.
The news was revealed by no less than Jim O’Sullivan, president and CEO of Mazda’s North American operations. In a statement he said to a number of Mazda dealerships across the continent, O’Sullivan said that after years of evaluating the shifting markets in the region, now looked like the best time to introduce the compact vehicle to a market that has long starved to see it out on the roads.
"As consumers’ tastes and attitudes toward small vehicles have changed, we now believe strongly there is a place in our lineup for a car below our current least-expensive car, the Mazda 3,” he said.
“The Mazda 2 will be true to everything that makes our cars stand apart from the competition: it will be stylish, fun-to-drive and a heck of a value. In short, it will be Zoom-Zoom."
Zoom-Zoom, indeed.
Off the bat, we’re already excited about the Mazda 2’s impending arrival on North American soil and we certainly can’t wait for the 2009 LA Motor Show later this year. Why, you ask?
Well, a certain car from Japan will be zoom-zooming its way to the show. Care to venture a guess what it is?
At first glance, those four objects on the photo seem to look like new-age mobile phones, and while we can’t fault you for thinking that way – they do look like mobiles from a distance – those are actually four concept vehicles Renault is planning to unveil at the Frankfurt Motor Show.
Say what?
Of course, the bird’s eye view of the cars doesn’t really help in deciphering what they really are, but take our word for it, those are Renault’s new electric concepts.
It’s an odd way to show images of the car really because it leaves room for a lot of speculation as to what these cars really look like. But maybe that’s exactly what Renault is aiming for.
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The German Sports car maker Porsche has announced that the highly anticipated four door sports saloon, the Panamera, will be made available for public purchase in its home market starting this Saturday, September 12th. When it is launched the all new Porsche Panamera will retail for 94,575 Euros for the base model that will be offered with the fuel saving Porsche PDK seven speed double clutch transmission. The PDK gearbox will come standard on the next level Panamera 4S that combines the automaker’s PTM all wheel drive system with a 400 HP V8 at a cost of 102,251 Euros.
The top of the line Panamera Turbo with be boosted all the way up to a tire shredding 500 HP and make the most of both the PDK and PTM systems for only 135,154 Euros. Although it may seem like quite a bit of money, you have to remember that there is no other car in the world like the Porsche Panamera, and aside from purchasing a piece of Porsche’s racing heritage you are also buying into a very exclusive club of automobile owners.
For owners looking to hold onto a little bit more of their pocket change, Porsche is also planning to offer a V6 powered Panamera as well as a hybrid version. The automaker is planning to release those two models at an undetermined later date. As for those customers in North America looking to get their hands on a piece of the Panamera, Porsceh isn’t going to bring the four door sports car stateside until early next year, along with Australia and China. However if you can’t wait until 2010 to get your hands on a Panamera, there is always the possibility of purchasing a black market model from South America because it will go on sale in the Southern Hemisphere later on this month.
Press release after the jump.
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Ferrari’s iconic prancing horse badge is as synonymous a symbol as any logo there is in the world. You show the badge to anybody from Antigua to Zanzibar and you’re more than likely to receive the same answer: “that’s the Ferrari logo”.
As it turns out, we’re not the only ones who share these sentiments.
In a recent poll commissioned by UK’s MPH with the help of Top Gear Live to determine the most ‘iconic performance car badge’ in the world, the unmistakeable Ferrari badge came out on top – by a landslide, no less.
The Prancing Horse took 48% of the total 5,235 votes, nearly double than what Aston Martin got (25%). Lamborghini came in third with its patented Raging Bull badge, but was nevertheless far off pace from the top two finishers, scoring only 9% of the total votes.
It’s worth noting that Ferrari has always been every man’s dream car so it hardly comes as a surprise that the boys from Maranello would come out on top of this one. After all, there aren’t that many car brands that have lived up to the extremely high standards it has set for itself than Ferrari, so you can be certain that their perch on top is well justified.
Ever since the new millennium began, there was one manufacturer that has held the title of number one luxury brand in America. That, of course, is Lexus. Toyota’s luxury line has obliterated any would-be contender for the top spot for the longest time – including perennial bridesmaids, BMW - and it has done so with relative ease. But with the numbers through the first eight months of 2009, it seems that that BMW is finally making some ground on Lexus and could – by the end of the year – dethrone its chief rival from the lofty perch it has held for years on end.
As of August 2009, Lexus is separated by only 2,293 vehicles from BMW – the closest its ever been n years – and with BMW posting ‘stronger’ sales for much of the year compared to Lexus, Toyota’s luxury line is in danger of falling into second place. Of course, we can’t give full credit to BMW for their ascent because we know the global economic crisis has played the biggest part in the reversal of fortunes of Lexus and BMW. Just to get things straight; both BMW and Lexus have been hit by the economic crisis hard, with sales of both brands suffering as a result. But it just so happens that Lexus has experienced the bigger drop in sales compared to BMW (40% to 28%) and that figure alone has constituted to BMW besting Lexus in 2009.
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With a plethora of new cars set to make their debut at the Frankfurt Motor Show, Lotus is taking a different route by bringing with them their newly-developed engine designed for future hybrid-drive vehicles.
The new engine, which comes in a revolutionary aluminum encasing that integrates the cylinder block, cylinder head, and exhaust manifold into one solid casting, which results in the car being extremely lightweight – weighing no more than 56 kilos – while also improving emissions and engine durability.
Likewise, the engine also comes with a 1.2 Liter, 3 cylinder Range Extender that, as Lotus claims, is the first of its kind built to cater specifically to the hybrid market. The new Lotus engine also features a two-valve port fuel injection system that can release a maximum output of 15kQ from 1,500 RPM to 3,500 RPM.
The new Lotus engine, which was developed as part of a project by the U.K. Technology Strategy Board, is a revolutionary achievement by Lotus in producing hybrid engines that are both highly-efficient and affordable.
Continued after the jump.
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Back on August 20th, Top Speed reported that the headquarters of the sports car manufacturer Porsche were raided by German officials in search of specific documents that would lead to prosecution of the Stuttgart based car maker’s former Chief Executive Officer, Wendelin Wiedeking, as well as the former Chief Financial Officer, Holger Haerter, regarding possible violations of the German securities laws and manipulation of the market with regard to the recent financial dealings with the automotive conglomerate Volkswagen.
The German manufacturer has now confirmed that subsequent searches have been carried out at private residences of select lower level Porsche employees. While the automaker has not revelaed the identity of the individual, an unnamed source informed Automotive News, "The investigators found what they were looking for." Just as we previously reported, Porsche is denying any allegations of bad conduct and continues to cooperate fully with the German government’s investigation.
The German regulatory body BaFin, which is similar to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, is mounting the investigation against the former Porsche CEO and CFO for alleged market manipulation and insider trading. While the investigation focuses on individuals who no longer work with company, the proceedings should not have an adverse affect on the sports car maker’s day to ay activities, however this wave of suspicion could do a number on the much larger Volkswagen AG, who just acquired a 42% share of the sports car maker from Stuttgart.
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