Car News

With SUV sales now ahead of conventional passenger cars - sedans, hatches, wagons, people-movers, convertibles and coupes - it's never been more important to be strong at this end of the market. Australians have purchased a record 692,000 new vehicles this year, 270,477 of which are SUVs. This compares to 266,059 passenger cars and 155,770 commercials - utes, vans and trucks.

The PSA Group, the parent company behind Peugeot, Citroen and DS, completed its takeover of Opel and Vauxhall from GM on August 1. Opel has promised to deliver a new performance plan within 100 days, with the key goal of achieving operational profitability by 2020 and a six per cent profit margin by 2026. GM's former European brands last turned a profit in 1999, and the General has lost an estimated US$15 billion ($18.6 billion) on the Continent since then.

Porsche has asked fans which classic models they would like to see driven, and they have delivered in the latest installment of its 'Top 5' video series.

Mitsubishi has released initial details of the work going into local preparation for its upcoming 2018 Eclipse Cross, set to debut in local showrooms by the end of the year. The company says the new SUV is undergoing suspension and steering calibration, powertrain assessment and noise vibration harshness (NVH) control to ensure it "meets the requirements of Australian customers".

The teaser campaign for the new Nissan Leaf continues apace, even after the second-generation electric hatchback's design was outed in undisguised, but grainy, photos earlier this week. The new Leaf, Nissan claims, benefits from a greatly improved aerodynamics. The second-generation model sits lower to the ground and has a design "inspired by airplane wings", resulting in "zero lift for better stability at high speeds" and improved stability in crosswinds.