Howard Polirer, a spokesman for AutoTrader.com, describes his site as “the number one car classified destination in the industry.” That claim is based on what he says are more than 14 million unique visitors per month. In a very down economy, traffic was up 20 percent in December over the previous year. The site has 40,000 dealers nationwide as paying customers, and offers 3.5 million new...
Auto Industry Archive
January 2009
Ford Credit is in better shape in some ways than rivals GMAC Financial Services and Chrysler Financial, but a sharp drop in new-vehicle volume in 2008; a rise in credit losses and repossessions; plus losses on off-lease trucks are forcing Ford Credit to cut 1,200 jobs, or about 20 percent of its U.S. work force. Lewis Booth, Ford executive vice president and CFO, said the job cuts will include...
Ford President and CEO Alan Mulally wants to have his cake and eat it, too. Mulally keeps insisting Ford doesn’t need a U.S. government bailout like Chrysler and GM. He did so again today, even as Ford reported a stiff net loss of $5.9 billion for the fourth quarter of 2008, and a net loss of $14.6 billion for the full year. “Customers are starting to see Ford really is...
The Fiat Panda: A version for the U.S.? Chrysler’s emerging alliance with Fiat is still in its infancy, but because the deal gives the U.S. carmaker access to a rich trove of Italian small car platforms speculation is rife. What’s coming here, and will the forthcoming cars be badged as Chryslers, Fiats or even Alfa-Romeos? In an earlier story, I put forth the retro Fiat 500 and the...
European governments have rolled out a variety of responses to the global auto-industry crisis, and continue to discuss additional measures. The actions in other countries underscore the virtually worldwide nature of the drop in consumer demand for vehicles, including mature markets like Europe, Japan and the United States, as well as developing auto markets like China, Russia and India. That...
NEW ORLEANS — Nobody is wishing for a return to the bad old days of poor quality for Chrysler, Ford and GM – they have enough trouble defending their market share. But in today’s market, households that are tightening their belts can safely hang onto their cars and trucks longer, and they are. In the fourth quarter of 2008, the age of the average trade-in jumped to 76...
An interesting footnote to the proposed Fiat-Chrysler merger announced last week is that Ford already has a relationship with Fiat. The little Ford Ka, going on sale now in Europe, is based on the same platform as the Fiat 500. Fiat also offers a feature it calls “Blue&Me,” similar to Ford’s Sync in-car system. Sync provides hands-free, voice-activated control of the...
NEW ORLEANS — The global auto industry is a small world, illustrated by the fact that Chrysler, Ford and GM respectively are just beginning a relationship with Italy’s Fiat Auto Group, in one already, or on the rebound from one. The Chrysler-Fiat deal announced earlier this week is Fiat’s newest and potentially most significant trans-Atlantic alliance. Fiat is set to take...
There are some intriguing synergies for shared environmental car platforms arising from the new alliance between Chrysler and Fiat. The nonbinding deal gives the Italian automaker 35 percent of Chrysler, which in turn gets access to Fiat’s fuel-efficient engines and small cars. The partnership is too new for actual product planning to have emerged. “We’ll know more around...
NEW ORLEANS — It took years for China auto industry expert Michael Dunne to convince the rest of the world that Chinese automakers really could mount a credible effort to export cars to North America — first with his own firm, and since 2006, as director, Asian operations, for J.D. Power and Associates. Having accomplished that, Dunne is now spending a lot of time explaining...
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