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News watch March 2011: today's auto industry news

Welcome to CAR Magazine's news aggregator as we round up the daily stories in the auto industry. Top tip: news summaries are added from the top hour-by-hour Thursday 31 March 2011• US President Barack Obama has strated all US government cars and trucks purchased from 2015 must be alternative-fuel vehicles (Automotive News)• Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn has denied a report in Japan's Nikkei newspaper that he is leaning towards a formal merger of Nissan and Renault (Reuters)• Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne says that Chrysler's share IPO may now take place in 2012, depending on financial progress this year (Bloomberg)Wednesday 30 March 2011• Tesla CEO Elon Musk has called a report that the EV carmaker is a takeover target 'bad analysis' and remains confident the firm will stay independent (Bloomberg)• The BBC denies that it rigged a December 2008 Top Gear TV test of the Tesla Roadster, in response to being sued by the EV carmaker (BBC News)• First Group, the UK's largest public transport operator, has announced a £160m investment in new buses, ordering 955 new buses from UK manufacturers Wrightbus and Dennis over the next two years (BBC News)• Japanese production woes look set to continue into April. Toyota expects the majority of Toyota and Lexus production on 14 April (Automotive News)• Saab production has re-started again, following a half yesterday afternoon.

Nissan upgrades the Versa engine to add mpg

The redesigned Versa sedan that reaches Nissan showrooms later this summer will post a 30 city/38 highway mpg rating, up from the current model's 28/34 rating. The Versa still has a 1.6-liter four-cylinder engine, but the 2012 model gets a dual-fuel injector system, the first U.S. application of the Nissan technology.

Eighty years of major motion…from Nissan

Today, Dec. 26, 2013, Nissan claims to celebrate 80 years of "moving people with innovative and exciting cars," according to a tersely worded press release. But like all stories, the press release is only the happy, corporate-sanitized version: the real story is a bit more involved than that.