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Ford Mondeo Vignale revealed – it’s back to the days of Ford Ghia

The Ford Mondeo Vignale (picture) has been revealed as Ford’s new range-topper Mainstream car makers have always tried to add some glitz and gloss to their models by tagging on a badge they thought made their cars more exclusive. Like Ford with endless ‘Ghia’ models sitting at the top of the Ford range after they bought Ghia of Turin in 1970. Ford continued to use the Ghia badge to mark out its best-equipped models until very recently (you could still buy a Fiesta Ghia as recently as 2008) but they finally dropped the badge and moved their top of the tree badge over to the ‘Titanium’ moniker.

Where is Kinetic Design headed?

Martin Smith has been guiding Ford of Europe's design efforts since he was appointed to the position of Executive Design Director in 2004, coming straight over from an illustrious career at General Motors. During his tenure as Director of Design at GM Europe, Smith oversaw the Insignia concept car as well as much of the Opel range, including the acclaimed Astra. At Ford, Smith spearheaded the automaker's 'Kinetic Design' strategy and has since presented this vision in both concept and production car form.

Jaguar Land Rover raise £500 million to fund expansion

Jaguar Land Rover raise £500 million Jaguar Land Rover is raising £500 million on the bond market to fund its expansion, including new models and new facilities. Hot on the heels of the Jaguar Land Rover joint venture deal with Chery in China comes the news that Jaguar has dipped in to the private bond market to raise £500 million to help with its bold and bullish plans to make JLR a major world player in the premium vehicle sector. JLR plans to invest £1.5 billion a year on expansion and is making sure its coffers can cope by issuing £500 million of senior notes due in 2020, with the net proceeds of the bonds being used for general corporate purposes.