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Who's Where: Martin Smith to retire, succeeded by Joel Piaskowski as Ford Europe head of design

Martin Smith, head of Ford of Europe design for the last 10 years, will retire at the end of this year, before which he will work on a project to study the future direction of the company's global design direction. He will be replaced by current head of strategic concepts group, Joel Piaskowski on 1 July. Smith (64) first joined Ford back in 2004, leaving General Motors as director of design for Opel/Vauxhall.

Daimler & BYD reveal the Denza EV Concept: Beijing 2012

Denza EV Concept The partnership between Daimler and BYD in China has revealed its first fruit – the Denza EV Concept - at the Beijing Motor Show. It’s just a few weeks since we learned that Daimler and BYD had come up with a name for their joint venture in China to produce New Energy Vehicles (basically EVs). Denza – or Tengshi, in Chinese – seeks to take Daimler’s expertise in car making (and they do claim more than any other car maker on the planet) and mate it with BYD’s undoubted expertise in electric cars to build a car company that only produces new energy vehicles.

Opel Ampera preview

Opel has released a teaser sketch of its new five-door extended-range electric car ahead of its public debut at the Geneva Auto Show in March. Based on the Voltec powertrain and chassis architecture of Chevrolet's Volt, the Ampera promises to surpass that car in terms of style by some margin. The body appears to be nearly identical between the A- and C-pillars, but the deformed horseshoe-shaped headlamp design and two-bar grille come straight from the 2007 Flextreme concept, as do the car's tree-branch alloy wheels.