Skoda sells 4500 new cars through scrappage

Skoda in the UK has taken over 4,500 new car orders as part of the government’s scrappage scheme which allows you to trade in a car or small van which is more than 10 years old and receive £2000 towards your new car.

The Scrappage Allowance/Vehicle Discount Scheme is a £300 million program,  introduced as part [...]

Magna offers more for Opel/Vauxhall

Canadian car parts maker Magna International offered to increase the amount of upfront capital it would invest in Opel/Vauxhall as part of a bid for the General Motors’ European unit, several sources have said according to Reuters Newsagency.

The revised bid leaves the total proposed amount at some 500 million euros (US$714 million), but tilts the [...]

Jaguar Land Rover reports huge loss

British luxury carmaker Jaguar Land Rover has reported a US$1-billion loss for 2008 but will receive a guarantee for a bridging loan from the British government, the British business newspaper, Financial Times, has reported.

The report, quoted by Reuters Newsagency, said the core British operations of Jaguar Land Rover, which is owned by India’s Tata Motors, [...]

Bidder could sell Opel back to GM

In a move that flies in the face of the expressed opinions of the German government, which controls the purse strings and the essentially the process on the future of General Motors troubled European unit, one bidder is reported to have acknowledged it could sell Opel/Vauxhall back to the US company.

RHJ International, a bidder for [...]

GM gets three final bids for Opel

General Motors said Monday that it had received three binding takeover offers for Opel that it would consider together with the European countries that would be affected by the deal.

In a surprise move, the once heavily favoured consortium of Magna International Inc. and Sberbank changed its plans at the last minute and agreed that they [...]

No GM buy back of Opel; German minister

Germany’s economics minister has ruled out any attempt by General Motors to include an option to buy back majority control of GM Europe, which produces Opel and Vauxhall vehicles, as part of a deal to give up more than 50 per cent of its German subsidiary in exchange for state aid.

“This is incompatible with our [...]

Volkswagen to take over Porsche – reports

There’s probably no better example of how the best laid plans can go horribly wrong in an economic crisis than the attempt by Porsche to take over Europe’s largest car maker, Volkswagen AG.

It now seems more than likely that Volkswagen will, in fact, take over Porsche’s sports car business if reports by Reuters Newsagency are [...]

Opel/Vauxhall future decided soon

While General Motors thrashes out the intricacies of its future in a US bankruptcy court, across in Europe the future of its loss-making Opel/Vauxhall subsidiary also hangs in the balance.

It seems increasingly likely that a majority chunk of GM Europe will end up in the hands of Canadian car parts maker Magna International and its [...]

Tata launches Jaguar/LandRover in India

Tata Motors Ltd, India’s largest vehicles maker, has announced the launch in India of Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles, the leading brands it bought from Ford Motor Company last year.

Saying it was a momentous occasion for the company, chairman Ratan Tata said, “This is in keeping with our desire to extend the penetration of the [...]

Fiat closes Chrysler deal

Fiat SpA has closed its acquisition of Chrysler’s strongest assets, a key step in the Italian carmaker’s ambitious plan to create a global player to ride out the worldwide automotive sales downturn.

The deal, announced jointly by Fiat and Chrysler, revives the 84-year old US carmaker that had been down to its last dollars before government [...]

Penske buys Saturn from GM

He’s been a racing driver, is a race team owner who just won the Indy 500 for the 15th time, a highly successful and very wealthy businessman, and now Roger Penske is also the proud owner of the not quite so proud General Motors brand Saturn.

General Motors Corporation has reached a preliminary agreement to sell [...]

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