+++ They’re hardly my best mates, but I do occasionally hang out with chief executives of motor manufacturing firms. These are the CEOs whose companies have spent many decades perfecting the art of designing, building, exporting and selling world-class cars to the masses. They have the specialist vehicle manufacturing experience, talent and knowledge. They’re on a different level to non car-making folk in other sectors. But if the CEOs I know best and respect most (Jaguar Land Rover’s Ralf Speth, Audi’s Rupert Stadler, Citroen’s Linda Jackson and Aston Martin’s Andy Palmer) told me they aimed to take on and beat the leading phone and computer firms, I’d laugh in their faces. Motor manufacturers dabbling in diversity is fine; thus their bicycles, furniture and clothing. But they know better than to try nicking customers from tech companies. There’s almost no high street demand for JLR mobiles, Audi laptops, Citroen desktops or Aston earpieces. Equally, I know of no paying APPLE customer who craves an iCar to accompany his iPhone. Why would they? If an Apple phone costs the best part of a grand, its car will be hugely overpriced, too. After all, this is the world’s most profitable firm with a weekly return of over $1 billion. It’s these excessive sums, earned from ‘mug punters’ like me over the decades, that have forced me to finally defect from Apple. I now have little interest in buying its products. And I have even less desire to purchase its inevitably expensive, possibly pig-ugly, ‘car’ (allegedly) of the future. Why are so many people taking it so seriously? Not a single one has been built/sold; and possibly never will. Thus my scepticism about the hype and prospect of Apple making the transformation from relatively piddly appliances to more complicated all-weather road vehicles. Just as a top car company would require a partnership with a leading tech firm like Apple to enter the mobile phone market, Apple needs to partner with (or acquire) a cutting-edge motor manufacturer if it’s to enter the car game. So I reckon a new Jaguar Land Rover Apple group designing and building petrol, diesel, LPG, electric and other alternative fuel vehicles, with or without drivers, might just work. But only if JLR’s fair and reasonable retail pricing policy is maintained, and Apple’s unfair and unreasonable one dumped. No company, not even one born and based in money-mad America, needs or deserves profits of $1 billion a week. +++
+++ AUDI ’s cutting-edge, fuel-saving Quattro Ultra all-wheel-drive system (which made its debut on the A4 Allroad and has just arrived in the second-generation Q5) will migrate to the new-generation A6 and A7 Sportback. Audi head of development of all-wheel-drive systems, Dieter Weidemann, confirmed that the Quattro Ultra technology would not simply proliferate across the brand’ s vehicle range and would be limited to certain models. “This Quattro Ultra system we built for the mid-size engines”, he said. “It is constructed for all variants with a longitudinal engine, so A4, A5, Q5, A6 and A7. It’s in … the next-generation A6 and A7”. Weidemann said the Quattro Ultra technology took about 6 years to bring to fruition and that the development team used the permanent all-wheel-drive Quattro with self-locking centre differential as a benchmark. While the tricked-out rear-drive-decoupling system would make the most sense in a smaller crossover such as the Q3 and Q2, or passenger cars including the A1 and A3, Weidemann said the decision is out of Audi’s hands. “The transversal engine models, the drivetrain is developed by VW and now they are thinking about it (utilising the Quattro Ultra technology), but there has not been a decision yet”, he said. “From a technical point of view it would be possible to adopt it to a transversal (engine), but as far as I know, there is not a decision made yet”. Similarly, Weidemann said Quattro Ultra also would not work for anything above the A7, as the system is built to handle engines outputting up to 500 Nm of torque and with an S-tronic dual-clutch automatic transmission. “We have a platform for the Q7, together with the Porsche Cayenne and the VW Touareg, and this platform, we only have the 8-speed automatic gearbox”, he said. “So the tunnel of the body of the Q7 was made for the Tiptronic 8-speed gearbox and not for the S-tronic”. Audi’s incoming Q8 will share its underpinnings with the already released Q7, which means the flagship crossover will feature the self-locking centre differential Quattro system with the option of a sports differential and an 8-speed tiptronic transmission. When asked if the Quattro Ultra system could be developed in reverse, to decouple the front axle and send power exclusively to the rear for a sports application, Weidemann said the technology was developed, but deemed ultimately impractical. “We built up demo cars with that front-axle decoupling, we had a deep look on that, but there are several reasons why we did not do that”, he said. “The main reason was the driving dynamic is better in our cars with direct drive through to the front wheels and a hang-on clutch to the rear wheels because you have less initial understeer. We made a lot of testings in our winter test centre with these 2 concept cars and it was absolutely clear that in an Audi it fits better to our perspective of driving dynamics with the direct drive through the front wheels. The next reason is you have more efficiency benefits if you have direct drive through the front wheels because if you are driving in front-wheel-drive mode, it’s all very compact and very efficient”. While BMW’s incoming M5, the new Mercedes-AMG E63 S and the Ford Focus RS all feature settings that allow more power to be sent to the rear wheels for a ‘drift mode’, Weidemann said such a setting is not within Audi’s thinking. “We are developing our Quattro system for the normal customer on the normal street, and of course, if a customer is going to a racetrack it should be very fast, but it must not be a drift mode”, he said. “It’s really obvious that if you have a rear-wheel-driven basis and a hang-on clutch to the front wheels, you have more understeer in initial turn in. So we want to have really high cornering speed, we want an easy-to-handle car, so even a normal customer can use as much of the potential of the car. We don’t want the car to do any strange behaviours or the driver is maybe not able to handle it, so it must be fast and easy to handle”. +++
+++ BENTLEY will launch a plug-in hybrid version of its Bentayga next year, using a supercharged 3.0-litre petrol V6 mated to an electric motor. The system, related to the one used in the Porsche Cayenne S E-Hybrid, is predicted to have a total output of 462 hp and feature a full-electric mode for zero-emission running. It’s due to make production next year, after the launch of the upcoming second-generation Continental GT. The plug-in drivetrain will broaden the appeal of the Bentayga (which has already enjoyed strong sales success with orders reaching their annual limit in the first year of production), particularly in markets where strict emissions limits are enforced. Bentley CEO Wolfgang Dürheimer confirmed earlier this year that all of the brand’s models would gain PHEV variants to address these scenarios. The company has also expressed interest in producing a fully-electric model, as previewed by the EXP12 Speed 6e concept of the Geneva motor show. +++
+++ BMW has announced that it will join the Formula E race series in time for the 2018/19 season, using a car with a new BMW-developed powertrain. BMW’s works entry will be run by the existing Andretti team, and the brand says that its involvement in the EV racing series will help influence its road cars in the future. “Through our involvement in Formula E, we are addressing the development towards sustainable and emission-free mobility in the automobile industry and are also making a contribution to the brand’s progression to BMW iNext”, said Klaus Fröhlich, Member of the Board of Management of BMW, and responsible for Research & Development. “The borders between production and motor racing development are more blurred at BMW i Motorsport than in any other project. The result is a technology transfer on a whole new level. We are certainly confident that the BMW Group will benefit greatly from the experience gained in the field of electrotechnology during this project”. BMW joins mainstream manufacturers Renault, DS and Jaguar in the electric series, as well as rival brand Audi, which will become a full works team at the beginning of the 2017/18 season. BMW is already involved in the sport to a degree, as both safety car and medical car duties are performed by a BMW i8 and i3 at present. It has also assisted the Andretti Formula E team since early 2016, but has only now confirmed its intention to take part in a full racing capacity having hinted at doing so late last year. +++
+++ Passenger-car sales in CHINA bounced back in June, raising hopes that the world’s biggest auto market is gaining momentum after a tepid start to the year. Passenger-car sales (which had declined in April and May; the biggest dip in 2 years) were up 2.3% in June from a year earlier, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers said. The 1.83 million vehicles sold pushed the first-half total to 11.25 million, up 1.6% from a year earlier. After last year’s exceptional 16% growth in passenger-car sales, China’s auto industry had expected a slowdown in 2017. Growth is still on track for 5% this year, assuming sales accelerate as expected in the second half, said Xu Haidong, the association’s assistant secretary-general. Total Chinese vehicle sales in the first half were up 3.8% to 13.35 million, buoyed by strong demand for commercial vehicles. Among foreign makers, Japanese companies had the biggest first-half games: Honda increased its China sales by 18.7%, Nissan by 6.7% and Toyota by 5.4%. Some nimble product launches struck a chord with Chinese buyers, said Yale Zhang, managing director of Automotive Foresight. For example, in March Honda launched the UR-V, a large SUV that taps into rising demand for such cars. Other foreign auto makers struggled in the first half. General Motors had a 2.5% drop in sales and Ford slumped 7%. Political tensions between Beijing and Seoul over South Korea’s missile-defense program contributed to a nightmare first half for Hyundai, whose sales plunged 47%. Both GM and Ford drew encouragement from strong June sales as they look to China to compensate for weak U.S. demand. GM posted a 4.3% sales bump last month, while Ford soared 15%. “The momentum we’ve found in Q2 and June, we’re optimistic about that rolling forward through the rest of the year”, Ford’s Asia-Pacific president Peter Fleet said in an interview, adding that the company expects high single-digit growth in China in the third quarter. GM plans to introduce 10 new models in China before the end of 2017, China head Matt Tsien said in a statement. Both U.S. makers benefited from their luxury brands: sales of GM’s Cadillac increased 75% in the first 6 months of the year, while Ford’s Lincoln doubled its sales. Auto sales in China surged in late 2016 as consumers bought ahead of an increase in the sales tax on small-engine vehicles to 7.5% from 5%. A planned increase to 10% at the end of the year (which would complete the unwinding of a tax cut made in 2015 to buoy a slumping market) could produce a similar late-year spike in sales, said Fleet, though he noted that some auto analysts think the government may put the plan on hold to help keep the market stable. It is unclear whether Beijing will go ahead with the tax increase, said Chen Shihua, assistant secretary-general at the automobile association, calling for greater policy continuity to assist the auto industry. Among Chinese makers posting strong first-half sales was SAIC Motor Corp., the country’s biggest car company. Its group sales were up 5.8% to just over 3 million vehicles, including joint-venture production with GM and Volkswagen. Sales of SAIC’s own-brand passenger cars more than doubled, albeit from a relatively low base. Geely Automobile Holdings’ sales nearly doubled in the first half, putting it on track to sell over 1 million vehicles in a year for the first time. Guangzhou Automobile Group Co.’s sales, including of joint-venture vehicles, were up 32% in the first half, with sales of own-brand cars up 57%. +++
+++ DACIA is celebrating a notable landmark with the production of the 1,000,000th car at a factory hailed as the most environmentally friendly in the automotive world. A Azurite Blue Dacia Lodgy rolled off the line in Tangier, Morocco, just over 5 years after the opening of the facility in February 2012. Since then, 474,840 Sanderos, 320,078 Dokkers and 193,181 Lodgys have been manufactured there, bound for 37 markets around the world. The production success at the 300-hectare site has been achieved in tandem with an environmental policy that is setting a blueprint for other manufacturers. Tangier is considered zero emissions in terms of CO2, with more than 90 percent of its requirements fulfilled by renewable energies. This is in the main thanks to a biomass heating plant and a programme designed to minimise consumption without compromising performance, leading to savings of 100,000 tonnes of CO2 annually. In addition, all its industrial wastewater is recycled thanks to a treatment plant, while consumption is strictly controlled, with 70 percent less water used than a plant with comparable capacity. Tangier is the biggest manufacturing facility south of the Mediterranean, with an annual capacity of 340,000 cars across its 2 lines. It is one of two Dacia plants in Morocco (the other is in Casablanca) and together they are responsible for more than half of the Dacias produced annually. Francois Mariotte, the brand’s sales and marketing director, told: “The Tangier plant is integral to the Dacia success story. Since its construction in 2012 it has experienced an exceptional ramp up and achieved the expected quality level in record time”. +++
+++ NISSAN believes it’s leading a worldwide taxi revolution. The Japanese automaker, fighting against a relatively unknown rival (China’s BYD), is one of the world’s biggest suppliers of electric taxi cars, thanks to the Leaf and the e-NV200. The company has sold last year in Europe alone more than 500 units, and they recently decided to show us what they’ve been up to in this specialized segment. For starters, the company says the Leaf and e-NV200 are used across 5 continents, 26 countries and in 113 cities all around the world. The first time Nissan’s all-electric cars became relevant as a taxi option was back in 2013 when a company in Japan decided to adopt revolutionary measures by converting their entire fleet of ICE-powered taxis into Nissan Leafs. Taxi companies in places such as Spain, The Netherlands, Hungary, the UK, Jordan, Mexico and Poland have now switched to Nissan electric taxis. The main assets for using all-electric cars are the lower emissions, increased savings and lower maintenance fees. In addition, the electric taxis are comfortable and quieter; enhancing rider comfort. Interestingly, we can also see an added benefit: people that would otherwise not consider a plug in model have a chance to actually test one, even if they do it as a rider. And seeing an all-electric car perform taxi duties (which is a hard workplace for any car) is surely increasing user confidence in terms of overall reliability. +++