Aeromotive 13128 on 2040-parts.com

Design-firm boss Sergio Pininfarina dies after long illness

Sergio Pininfarina, who ran the famous Italian automotive design company of the same name for 40 years, has died after a long illness. He was 85. Pininfarina had the last word on the company's design projects for almost 50 years.

Buy a Spyker Bond and get a cheap Spyker B6 Venator

Buy a Spyker Bond and get a cheap B6 Venator (pictured) Last year, Victor Muller seemed to have pulled off something of a coup for Spyker by delivering concepts of the B6 Venator Coupe and Spyder to much acclaim, which looked like a car that could kick-start Spyker’s rather troubled business model. After a foray in to Saab ownership, Victor Muller lost Spyker to CPP, but CPP’s reliance on finance from Victor’s pal Vlad the banker proved to be CPP’s downfall and Victor emerged, somehow, back in control of Spyker. But despite Victor’s legendary ability to schmooze finance from the most unlikely sources, it seems he’s run in to a bit of trouble with financing production of the Venator, so he’s come up with a plan that looks to be a cross between a lottery and crowd funding.

Fiat plans new high-performance Abarth models

Abarth Abarth, the tuning company owned by Fiat, is looking to grow the number of models it offers including a hot version of the 500L supermini, MSN Cars can reveal. Speaking exclusively to MSN Cars, Marco Magnanini, the European boss of Abarth, hinted that other models from Fiat could be given the Abarth treatment. When quizzed about the possibility of an Abarth 500L, he said: “The 500 family will offer us options.