News watch April 2010: today's auto industry news

Welcome to CAR'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 29 April 2010
• The European Commission has published a document outlining plans to encourage the take-up of electric cars. It includes a strategy for a common charging socket (Financial Times)
• BMW has leapfrogged Toyota as the world's most valuable automotive brand, according to the BrandZ Top 100 survey. It cited the recall crisis for Toyota's slippage down the ranks (Automotive News)

Wednesday 28 April 2010
• Honda has lifted its profit forecast by a quarter to Y340bn ($3.6bn) in the financial year to March. It said demand had recovered strongly (Financial Times)
• Oil giant Shell has seen quarterly profits jump by 50% (BBC News)
• Porsche has had to recall every single Panamera built – all 11,300 of them – to fix potentially dodgy seatbelt pre-tensioners (Automotive News Europe)
• Caterham is ramping up production at its Dartford, UK, plant to meet rising demand and cut the three to four month waiting list. Production is set to rise by 26% in 2010 and the business has taken on a fifth more staff (Caterham)

Tuesday 27 April 2010
• Ford shares have slipped 4% today, despite the American car giant announcing $2bn (£1.3bn) profits yesterday. Monday’s share price of $14.46 was the highest since January 2005 (Detroit Free Press)
• American car manufacturer General Motors is to invest $893m (£590m) to build the next generation of V8 engines. GM will upgrade five plants in North America, and the new engines will be made from aluminium, feature direct injection, and be able to run on E85 (Automotive News)

Monday 26 April 2010
• Ford has recorded a $2.08bn (£1.3bn) profit for the first quarter of 2010, the American car manufacturer announced today. The results were up on the same period last year ($1.76bn) and on many Wall Street expectations, which believed Ford would post profits of around $1bn (Detroit Free Press)
• Having failed to secure an entry into the 2010 F1 World Championship, Stefan GP has announced it will apply to enter the sport in 2011. The team’s owner, Zoran Stefanovic, has also unveiled plans for an F1-spec race track to be built outside Belgrade (Autosport)
• Ferrari F1 driver Fernando Alonso has had his thumbs insured for €10m. It’s part of a deal with Ferrari sponsor Santander, which will also provide Alonso with life and accident insurance over the next year (Autosport)

Friday 23 April 2010
• Barcelona and Argentinean footballer Lionel Messi has signed a deal with China’s largest domestic car manufacturer, Chery, to be the face of the brand’s international expansion (BBC)
• Brazil’s Minas Gerais regional state has banned the sale of the Toyota Corolla, claiming the accelerator problem was ‘putting in danger the lives of occupants’.
(BBC)
• Ferrari, Mercedes and other Formula 1 teams expect the sport to adopt turbocharged and direct injection 1.5-litre engines with around 670bhp from 2013 (Autosport)

Thursday 22 April 2010
• Chrysler will step in to help Alfa Romeo – with two new crossovers for the US and Europe. At Chrysler's results announcement yesterday, CEO Sergio Marchionne announced seven new Alfas to be launched between 2010 and 2014 (Automotive News)
• Credit raters at Moodys have downgraded Toyota's rating one notch to Aa2. It's still the third highest rating of its 10-step ranking of debt security (Financial Times)
• Volkswagen's first-quarter profits have jumped thanks to a doubling of sales in China and record sales at Audi (Automotive News Europe)
• The sale of Volvo to Geely has taken so long to conclude because of the careful steps taken to protect Ford's intellectual property. 'When [all the IP agreements] were laid out, they went from one end of a boardroom table to the other,' said one person in on the negotiations in London. They clarify who owns what technology, agreements for use and sharing, plus penalties for breaches (Detroit News)
• Fiat chairman Luca di Montezemolo is stepping down from his role at Fiat SpA, but will remain on the group board and as chairman of Ferrari. He is widely tipped to be entering politics – some even believe he could become the country's next president (Automotive News Europe)
• UK car production enjoyed a record 90% jump in March, recovering from last year's shutdown as the recession bit. A total of 118,000 cars were built here last month (SMMT)

Wednesday 21 April 2010
• General Motors has  repaid $8.1bn in loans from the US and Canadian governments (BBC News)
• Chrysler is on course to break even in 2010, as it today announced an operating profit of $143m and generated $1.5bn in the first quarter, despite losing $197m net in the first three months of 2010. Chief exec Sergio Marchionne said the results were a 'concrete indication' that the company's fortunes were on the rebound (Financial Times)
• BMW has halted production at three of its plants owing to the volcanic ash cloud over Europe. Delays to air travel have held up parts deliveries for around 7000 vehicles, but the line should be up and running by later this week (Automotive News)

Tuesday 20 April 2010
• The small matter of a CAR Online relaunch today was the main news at CAR HQ today!

Monday 19 April 2010
• The Sunday Times reports that Jaguar Land Rover may give a reprieve to one of the doomed factories in the UK. JLR was due to close either Solihull, Castle Bromwich or Halewood, but the new Tata-led management team and an upswing in sales may keep all three plants going – especially if the Government steps in with aid, reports the newspaper (Automotive News Europe)
• GM chief exec Ed Whitacre is a different kind of CEO, reports the local newspaper. He's apparently developing a reputation for wandering into meetings unannounced and speaking to shop-floor staff (Detroit News)
• The recent tie-up between Daimler and Renault-Nissan is already creating tensions, as both partners want to have battery leadership, reports ANE (Automotive News Europe)
• Nissan has taken over from BMW as the automotive sponsor of the O2, the London venue formerly known as the Millennium Dome. Nissan aims to use the site as a showcase for its electric vehicles, led by the Leaf (Nissan)

Friday 16 April 2010
• Chrysler may not exist in its current form for much longer, warned a senior analyst today. Max Warburton of Bernstein Research in London said in a report that the cost-cutting at Chrysler was 'impressive' but doubted Sergio Marchionne's turnaround plan (Automotive News)
• New car sales in Europe rose by 10.8% in March – one of the biggest jumps for years. In total 1.64 million vehicles were registered, but industry group ACEA said tough times were ahead as scrappage schemes came to an end (Automotive News Europe)
• Ford has lambasted a government bail-out of Opel-Vauxhall – saying it's skewing the natural restructuring the industry requires to fix its woes. 'We are definitely against any support for Opel for restructuring its business because we think this is the company's own business and not the taxpayer's business,' said Wolfgang Schneider, Ford of Europe's head of legal, governmental and environmental affairs (Financial Times)
• Budget Car Rental is expanding its UK operation with the launch of seven new airport locations – including hitherto unserved sites such as Liverpool's John Lennon Airport (Budget)

Thursday 15 April 2010
• Volkswagen has raised about €4.1bn in net proceeds to fund its takeover of Porsche. Most of that came from the sale of 64.9m preferred shares at €65 each. At a current value of €69.69, the company is now valued at €33.3bn (Automotive News Europe)
• Lexus has extended the suspension of GX 460 sales worldwide. As reported yesterday, consumer group Consumer Reports found it could roll over (BBC News)

Wednesday 14 April 2010
• Lexus has suspended sales of the GX460 in America, after a consumer group warned it could roll over. Toyota is sensitive to consumer complaints at present after the global recall brouhaha (BBC News)
• GM and Volkswagen are raising their sales forecasts in China, as the world's biggest car maker continues to beat expectations. GM's boss in China Kevin Wale predicted the firm would sell 2m cars in China this year – four years ahead of schedule (Financial Times)
• China new car sales are forecast to hit 17 million in 2010 – up 25% on last year
• Chrysler and space agency Nasa are teaming up on advanced technologies, such as materials science, radar and robotics (Autoblog)
• Daimler said today it would earn more than €2.3bn in operating profit this year with all divisions returning to the black (Automotive News Europe)
• Russia's first hybrid car project is underway, steered by billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov. His Onexim Group is investing €150m in a joint venture with truck maker Yarovit. Expect to see the first prototypes in December (Automotive News)

Tuesday 13 April 2010
• BMW has kept ahead of Audi to stay the world's number one premium marque in the first quarter of 2010. Global sales for BMW jumped 14% to 265,809 vehicles – Audi nudged ahed of Merc with 264,100 sales in the quarter (Automotive News)
• Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne predicts the next European merger will involve a French car maker. 'They tried with Mitsubishi and they will try with someone else,' he said today, speaking in Rome (Automotive News Europe)
• Smart's US champion, former racer turned car dealer magnate Roger Penske, is adamant the Fortwo has a future in America. Sales have been disappointing for Daimler's micro car, but an expanded range could change all that (Autoblog Green)
• Volvo's new owner Geely hopes to reach breakeven with its new Swedish acquisition by the fourth quarter (Automotive News Europe)
• The US Treasury's aid programme for components suppliers has quietly ended this month (Detroit News)

Monday 12 April 2010
• Ford will extend its EcoBoost downsizing tech to three additional engines in the US by the end of 2010. Expect direct injection, turbocharging and variable valve cam timing will be rolled out to a new 1.6, 2.0 and 3.5 V6 (Automotive News)
• Last week's Daimler-Renault-Nissan partnership was driven by CO2 legislation, points out the FT. It predicts further similar alliances as makers scramble to cut their fleet averages (Financial Times)

Friday 9 April 2010
• New car sales in China jumped by 63% in March 2010 over the year before. The China Association of Automobile Manufacturers reported 1.26 million (Detroit News)
• The AA breakdown service is going to strike over the May bank holiday, starting for 48 hours from 2 May (BBC News)
• Toyota knew of the flaws in its brake pedals as long ago as 2006, claims a report in trade mag AN. Apparently Toyota knew about the potential for floor mats to slip under accelerator pedals as early as February 2006 (Automotive News)

Thursday 8 April 2010
• The end of the UK's scrappage scheme has sparked a big boost in registrations last month – with a 27% jump in new car sales in March 2010 compared with the same month last year. A total of 397,383 cars were registered, according to the SMMT (BBC News)
• GM says it is on track to turn an operating profit this year after coming close to breaking even in the first quarter (Financial Times)
• Meanwhile, GM is finally closing Hummer for good and said it is no longer willing to take any further offers for the brand (Automotive News)
• Staff at British breakdown service the AA have voted to go on strike in a row over pension rights. It's the first time AA patrolmen have ever taken industrial action (BBC News)

Wednesday 7 April 2010
• Audi has recorded its best ever quarterly sales figures in China. In the first three months of 2010 the German company sold 51,449 cars, a rise of 77% over the same period in 2009 (Audi)
• Daimler and Renault-Nissan have struck an alliance to jointly develop cars, share technologies and save costs - full story here

Tuesday 6 April 2010
• The American transport department is to fine Toyota a record $16.4m for withholding information on its throttle pedal recall (BBC News)
• The proposed Renault-Nissan and Daimler alliance could save 'billions of euros' in reduced development costs on small cars, insiders have told ANE (Automotive News Europe)
• Mercedes is considering making the S-class range all-hybrid – a move which is worrying US dealers, who fear petrol-electric cars are still not perceived as being class leaders (Automotive News)
• Chrysler's parts and tuning arm Mopar is to take on a more important role in the business plan, reports The Detroit News (Detnews.com)

Monday 5 April 2010
• Bank holiday Monday in the UK (see Friday's entry)

Friday 2 April 2010
• Good Friday, little to report in CAR Towers as we slope off for an Easter weekend of chocolate munching and writing (it's press week for the magazine)

Thursday 1 April 2010
• Virgin Racing's technical director Nick Wirth says his company, Wirth Research, will pay for the modifications needed to the team's F1 cars. Virgin, a new team to the F1 championship, needs to make major changes to their cars after discovering that the fuel tanks are too small to complete a race. Wirth Research desgined the Virgin team's cars (BBC)
• The new Renault Wind CC will cost from £15,500 to £18,200. The Dynamique 1.2 TCe kicks off the range, the Dynamique S 1.6 VVT is £17,300, and the 200-run special edition Collection models are £17,300 for the 1.2 and £18,200 for the 1.6. UK deliveries start in July (Renault)

By Ben Pulman and Tim Pollard