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Detroit Auto Show roundup

The 2012 NAIAS in Detroit, MI has proved to be exactly the dose of salts the US auto industry so desperately needed after a few very lean years for the event. Numerous concept and production cars made their debuts in the halls of COBO and, as ever, Car Design News was on hand to provide our in-depth live show coverage. Here's a full rundown of our reportage from NAIAS 2012: Acura Acura NSX Concept: Living up to the name Cadillac Cadillac ATS: Finally breaking into the premium mainstream?

McLaren SLR Edition revealed

McLaren SLR Edition A year ago – almost to the day – we reported that the very last McLaren SLR had rolled off the production line (well, production floor is more like it at McLaren) and that McLaren and Mercedes were going their own ways – McLaren with the McLaren MP4-12C and Mercedes with the Mercedes SLS AMG. The swansong for the SLR was the SLR Stirling Moss, an SLR dressed up like a silver arrow car from the 1930s, without a roof and only a vestigial windscreen. Or at least we we believed the Stirling Moss was the last SLR.

Crunch watch Dec 08: the auto industry in crisis

By Tim Pollard and Simon Stiel Motor Industry 31 December 2008 14:05 Wednesday 31 December 2008• GMAC, GM's finance arm, said it would immediately revise its criteria for providing loans, after the US government bail-out of the General's credit arm. It will now supply credit for anyone with a score of 621 or more on the Fico scale, the scale used to assess Amercian customers' creditworthiness (Financial Times)• The news means that 80% of US consumers would now qualify for a loan from GMAC – which should improve sales in the depressed US market (Detroit News)• Chrysler is being lambasted for taking out full-page adverts in the American national press thanking the nation for supporting its auto industry. But critics point out this is a fresh waste of bail-out resources, as pages in the Wall Street Journal – one of the titles in which the ad ran – reportedly cost up to $264,000.