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Video: Chris Bangle delivers “Empowerment: Design without Designers” talk at Creative Mornings/London

Chris Bangle – the undisputed front man of car design – needs little introduction, so the prospect of the former BMW Design Director and now founder of Chris Bangle Associates giving a talk in our home town of London was too good to pass up. His presentation (which you can watch in full in the video to the left) touched on his time at BMW, but was more focused on the idea of empowering others to create: "design without you in the middle", as Bangle says. From the story of the co-creation of the staircase in his Italian studio to the idea of encouraging people to think about their culture when designing, his philosophies transcend disciplines.

GM to pull Cadillac from some European markets

General Motors will halt Cadillac sales in more than half of the brand's European markets following the collapse of its regional distributor. The U.S. carmaker will focus on markets such as Russia, the United Kingdom and Switzerland where the luxury brand has been able to compete against Germany's BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Audi premium brands.

Dacia's UK launch postponed

By Tim Pollard Motor Industry 19 June 2008 12:31 Renault has pulled the UK launch of its budget brand, Dacia. It had planned to launch the cheap 'n' cheerful badge in the UK in February 2009, but that's now gone back a year, the company announced today. CAR was due to drive the Sandero – the UK launch model – in July 2008, but PRs today took the unusual step of ringing the media to cancel the event.