Archive for November, 2010
Construction on Hyundai’s third China plant begins, goals of one million car production set
Beijing-Hyundai laid the foundation stone for its third car factory in China in Beijing Shunyi district yesterday. Leaders from Beijing city government were in attendance, showing Hyundai’s importance in the local community, and also high level leaders from Hyundai were present. The new factory will have a combined production capacity of 400,000 new cars and [...]
Englon brand to get major boost in 2011
Englon was born from the ashes of the doomed Shanghai Maple brand, both of which are controlled by Geely. Shanghai Maple was Geely’s ultra cheap economy brand, and was reborn as the Englon brand in early 2010 as part of Geely’s restructuring. At the Beijing 2010 Auto Show Geely announced dozens of new cars in [...]
Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-11-28
Nearly knocked off my bike this morning. Perhaps time to rethink this no car policy as discussed here: http://bit.ly/bgZSmy # test # CCT acting odd due to software upgrade – please report any bugs you find! # Shandong Air = China's worst airline company. Miss a plane due to not being able to land, and [...]
Mazda8 launched in China
Earlier today the Mazda8 officially launched in China and is set to make a big splash in the MPV segment. The MPV market has increased by over 60% in 2010 alone, the Mazda8 will be competing against the Buick GL8 in the higher end MPV segment, until now the GL8 has had a free run [...]
Beijing City Government offering subsidies of 120,000rmb to private EV buyers
The Ministry of Science and Technology recently announced its plans to offer up to 120,000rmb in subsidies to private buyers of new energy vehicles in Beijing city, which is being used as a test bed for the project before it will be rolled out nationwide Beijing City Govt are planning on giving subsidies of 3000rmb [...]
New Chevrolet Spark to launch in Guangzhou
With the launch of the BaoJun brand and BaoJun 630 sedan it appears that Chevrolet maybe going slightly more up market and is expected to import the latest generation of the Chevrolet Spark into China soon. The new generation of Spark is produced in Korea and will therefore be a fairly cheap import into China [...]
Its not a Merc – Its BAW’s latest MPV
For those that are thinking “the new B-Class looks different”, well think again as this is the new MPV from BAIC, who also happen to be major partners to Mercedes. From what we have learned so far, the first BAIC C30 MPV will be powered by 1.3L and 1.5L engines from Mitsubishi. The 1.3L engine [...]
Hyundai to build third plant, have one million car capacity in China
Beijing Hyundai, the tie up between Beijing Auto Industry Corporation and Hyundai, are about to see the launch of the third plant in China. Hyundai already has two factories in Beijing that can both produce a maximum 300,000 cars per year, but the third factory is set to be larger and will have a maximum [...]
Toyota Verso to launch in Guangzhou
Toyota are having a rough time in China, the worlds no. 1 automaker can’t seem to make cars that resonate loudly enough with consumers, and are thus reverting to GM’s rule book by making smaller, cheaper cars. The current small car line up at Toyota China is relatively limited, with only the developing market only [...]
Chery’s Six Speed CVT to launch next year
Chery have been working very hard on developing their own engine and gearbox line over the past 5 years, their ATECO engine range is starting to bare fruit after several years of hard toiling in the form of 2.0T engines that are used in the current G5 and G6 sedans and will soon be found [...]
Ford adding 66 new dealers to line up
From WSJ: Ford Motor Co. said it plans to add an additional 66 dealers in China in the closing weeks of this year, expanding its dealer network in the country by nearly a fourth as part of an effort to push more aggressively into smaller cities and towns where demand for cars is surging.The late-year [...]
GWM’s high end car in rendered form
Great Wall Motors (GWM) once displayed a wonderful sports concept sedan in April 2009 but is taking its time to get the concept to the production stage. The rendering to the left is apparently one of GWM’s first shots at building a production ready sedan, the sedan may look rather basic in the renderings but [...]
Photoblog: 2011 Brilliance Wagon
The Brilliance Wagon never took to the market in a great way, the wagon market was identified as one of the niche markets that Brilliance could move into to fend off pressure in other segments, and other Chinese manufacturers had yet to hit the wagon segment. Brilliance brought out the first wagon in late 2008 [...]
GM planning for 100 BaoJun dealerships in 2011
From Reuters: General Motors Co (GM.N) and its Chinese partner SAIC Motor Corp Ltd (600104.SS) plan to have more than 100 dealerships ready in China for its newly-created Baojun brand before the first car hits the market in the first half of next year, a senior GM executive said on Tuesday. Earlier this week, SAIC-GM-Wuling, [...]
Is the Regal GS China bound?
The Buick Regal has already been on the market in China for the past 18 months or so, but it could about to be joined by the Regal GS – the American version of the 2.0T that is already on the market in China. When we say “already on the market” what we mean is, [...]
Lifan to debut on Shanghai stock market this week
From Reuters: Shares of Lifan Industry which raised 2.9 billion yuan ($437 million) in an initial public offering, will make their trading debut in the Shanghai Stock Exchange on Thursday. Lifan, which makes motorcycles and cars, has issued 200 million shares at 14.5 yuan per share, it said in a stock exchange filing. Proceeds will [...]
Spy shots: New Buick GL8 MPV in the flesh
MPV’s have stayed in the realm of business use in China, where as in Western countries they are used for larger families that require extra space for the road – due to Chinese families being largely nuclear, there is of course not much need for a 7 seater van on every driveway in China (or [...]
Photoblog: BaoJun 630
The first BaoJun 630 came down the production line yesterday and it seems to be a good looking car. The interior is certainly from GM’s parts bin, but the exterior is very similar to SAIC’s Roewe 350 and has some Roewe 550 looks in there also, the whole car looks exceptionally well for a vehicle [...]
Qingdao City Government report on the roads reveals growing traffic crisis
Whilst growing car sales are a major bonus for the Chinese economy, they are a major blow to the inner city traffic system which is quite literally bulging at the seems right now. A recent government investigation into the traffic problem in Qingdao has revealed some interesting information. The investigation found that Qingdao’s city roads [...]
MG3 and 750 hybrid spy pics extravaganza
Leading upto the launch of the MG3 we’ve seen quite a few MG3 spy pics but what we haven’t yet seen is a mixture of high end and low end models out testing and of course the Roewe 750 hybrid model has yet to be seen. Look out for the pair of them at the [...]
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