Archive for September, 2011
Hyundai to develop new electric car brand for China
Hyundai Motor Co. is preparing to develop a new electric vehicle (EV) brand exclusively for Chinese consumers in a bid to further boost its presence in the world’s largest automobile market, company officials said Tuesday. Beijing Hyundai Motor Co., a 50-50 joint venture between Hyundai Motor and Beijing Automotive Co. established in 2002, plans to [...]
Demand for Chinese cars makes exports surge
Chinese car brands may not have landed in the West, but they are encircling mature markets in developing countries where the demand for low cost cars is at an all time high, of course Chinese car manufacturers have been wise to step in to fill the demand. Markets such as Brazil, Chile, Egypt and Turkey [...]
Maserati recall 56 cars in China
Italian super car manufacturer Ferrari will begin the recall of 56 Maserati’s in the Chinese market over the next month, the recall is being held in partnership with the Chinese quality watchdog. The recall includes 37 Quattroporte and 19 Gran Tourismo’s that were sold between July 2008 and Sept 30th of 2008, the recall is [...]
Sichuan BoHong Buys Canadian Parts Company
From LFPRess.com: Wescast Industries Inc., a Brantford-based auto parts maker with plants in Strathroy and Wingham, is being bought by a Chinese company for about $180 million. The company announced a preliminary agreement with Sichuan Bohong Industry Co., which is paying $13.60 a share. Wescast makes exhaust manifolds for cars and light trucks. It employs [...]
Peugeot RZC arrives in China
Peugeot have launched their flagship RCZ sports car in the Chinese market earlier this month, the small two seater sports car is priced in the middle of the range at 328,800rmb to 356,800rmb, priced below it are the Mazda MX5 and Hyundai Coupe 2.0T whilst ahead of it are the R-Line series from VW and [...]
BYD E6 gets make over – becomes more handsome
In the face of ever increasing oil prices some companies stepped up and produced EV’s, GM produced the Volt, Nissan made the Leaf, Honda tried another route with a hybrid sports car that the everyday man could afford, Tesla threw caution to the wind and made a super car for super salary owners. BYD on [...]
BYD cuts jobs, and cuts internet access too.
Soon after BYD released news stating that it would cut up to 1800 members of staff, including 1000 members of its sales team, BYD apparently cut the internet in BYD offices to stop further news leaks. Chinese media are quoting one member of staff who posted on their Weibo (Chinese Twitter style service) “Redundancies are spreading to [...]
Yema clones the Audi A4 to make its own wagon, possibly Austin Maestro based
This is a long story, so we are going to make it as short as possible. Back when MG-Rover was a solvent company it was looking to offload as much of its IPR without selling its core models IPR that was still on the market at the time, going through their portfolio it was found [...]
Volvo speeds up localization of products
In a recent interview with Chinese media Volvo’s China CEO, Zhang Shen Hui, revealed that the company’s plans for two new factories in Chengdu and Daqing are currently with the government and awaiting approval, it is expected that the company will gain approval relatively quickly and should have official word by the end of the [...]
GM’s Chevrolet Sail EV to launch soon, but possibly under yet another brand
We first saw the Chevrolet Sail EV at the Guangzhou Auto Show at the end of last year, but being in Guangzhou at Christmas time in 25 degree heat made us focus more on drinking cocktails at the cities brilliant late night out door cafes than covering yet another car show, the EV Sail did [...]
China Auto Sales to Grow By Just 5% in 2011
Bloomberg are reporting that the Chinese car market is expected to grow by just 5% in 2011 down from the massive 32% of growth that was delivered in 2010 and the years before it. What’s causing the slow down? Increased car taxes and various anti-car policies as well as the staggering amounts of traffic already [...]
VW Jetta to get new platform and to be called Jetta NF in 2012
The VW Jetta as we know it in China maybe finally going to the scrapyard in the sky, although Chinese manufacturers always demand the latest technology and engines from their joint venture partners they tend to loath to throw out the older platforms, especially if they are still road worthy. Which is pretty much how [...]
C-NCAP smashes more cars, also raises the rules for 2012
C-NCAP, the Chinese crash testing authority, recently set up another round of car smashing and let us know the results. Although the C-NCAP is tested at a slightly slower speed than the Euro NCAP the rest of the test is quite comprehensive. However due to the ever increasing number of cars gaining a 5 star [...]
Facelift Tiguan spotted in China – Blue Motion to come soon
At last years Beijing Auto Show VW made a big introduction of the Blue Motion technology with Chinese speaking Laowai’s (Westerners) on hand to introduce the Blue Motion concept to a largely unresponsive crowd, but of course when it comes to the possiblity of saving money on fuel costs crowds suddenly become interested. In certain [...]
Brilliance H7 sedan to be BMW 5-Series based
Brilliance and BMW have been partnered for several years and have focused on building the 3 and 5-series models in the Chinese market, although to expand their sales BMW are planning to introduce more locally made products such as the BMW 1-series and X1 as locally made products. Brilliance on the other hand have been [...]
FAW-VW to develop own VW models
The 20-year-old FAW-Volkswagen joint venture is about to enter an historical turning point, that is to transform from pure introduction and production of Volkswagen’s prototype models to development of auto products based on the unique demands of Chinese consumers by 2015. The company’s executive in charge of R&D told that the company is expected to [...]
Zotye sends plans for mini car to patent office
Being a relatively small privately owned car company surrounded by state owned car companies with swelling coffers is no easy task, but Zotye have avoided the mergers so far. Instead of waiting to be taken over, Zotye are planning to establish their independence and have moved away from being a one car line up to [...]
Brilliance SUV to become the V5
The Brilliance SUV has been posted to the hallowed pages of China Car Times many a time before now, so we will not bore you with yet more pictures of the attractive compact SUV that has more than just a little bit of a passing resemblance to the BMW X1, but we can tell you [...]
Harman going after Chinese consumers, will help Geely with sound systems
From China Daily: “Our sales goal is to achieve $1 billion a year by 2015 in the Chinese market, which means we have to grow our business here by 35 percent every year,” said Dinesh Paliwal, chairman, president and chief executive officer of the US company. “We also plan to triple our head count by [...]
BYD VP talks on BYD’s sales drop – it’s part of the plan, stupid.
Stella Li, BYD’s latest VP gave some insight to The Wall Street Journal as to why BYD’s sales have gone south for the past two years after a sterling 2008 and 9. Stella reveals that this is part of BYD’s master plan to capture the second time car buyer who is readying to swap their [...]
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