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Ford warms up new era of car-guy leaders

A minor temblor shook Dearborn, Mich., today with the announcement that Mark Fields, president of the Americas, climbed the golden corporate ladder to grab the chief operating officer ring, setting him up to succeed Alan Mulally in a couple of years. The move did not come as a shock-it only confirmed the whispers of auto industry Royal Watchers. The biggest news for those who care about cars, however, is two-fold: Jim Farley, Ford's global marketing boss, also takes the helm of Lincoln.

AutoWeek Design Forum: McLaren evolves with carbon fiber

McLaren Automotive design boss Frank Stephenson detailed his company's transformation from strictly racing to producing road-going models on Thursday at the AutoWeek Design Forum. McLaren is launching the highly anticipated MP4-12C this year, and the company has been hard at work refining the use of carbon fiber, which it pioneered in the iconic McLaren F1. The company cut the amount of time required to design a carbon-fiber tub from 3,000 hours for the F1 to a mere four hours for the MP4-12C.

Toyota GT86 Convertible? Meet the Scion FR-S Speedster

Scion FR-S Speedster Toyota Racing will debut a convertible GT86 in the shape of the Scion FR-S Speedster at the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach. Even before the Toyota GT 86 hit the roads we were expecting a convertible version to be not far behind. In fact, Toyota’s chief engineer, Tetsuya Tada, confirmed last month that the GT86 / Subaru BRZ / Scion FR-S was conceived as a convertible and that Toyota are working on a production version.