smart fortwo gets a facelift for 2012

The smart fortwo gets a nip and tuck for 2012 The smart fortwo has been given a small cosmetic facelift for 2012, and will debut at the Geneva Motor Show in March. The perpetual loss-maker for Mercedes that is the smart car (the other being Maybach, which is now being left to wither on the vine) still continues, and Mercedes are planning a replacement, previewed by the recent smart forvision concept which heralds the new smart fortwo which will share its platform with the next Renault Twingo. But to freshen the current smart fortwo until the all new smart fortwo arrives, Mercedes has rolled out a few cosmetic tweaks for the current smart fortwo for 2012, but haven’t bothered to tweak either the chassis or engines.

Jaguar Land Rover boss dies (2008)

Geoff Polites, Jaguar Land Rover CEO: 1948-2008 By Gavin Green Motor Industry 21 April 2008 06:53 Geoff Polites, who died yesterday aged 60, will go down as one of the great British car industry bosses. He took over as CEO of Jaguar Land Rover in September 2005, when the Jaguar half of the business was at its lowest ebb. Sales of the lame duck X- and S-types were fast evaporating; Jaguar was consistently failing to hit its financial forecasts; morale was poor.

Spyker confirms Peking to Paris will be a V8

Spyker confirms that the Peking Paris luxury 4x4 will be a V8 not a V12 [ad#ad-1] We brought you an exclusive the other day that Spyker will drop the planned V12 version of its uber-4×4 – The Spyker Peking-Paris D12 – in favour of a supercharged V8 – The Spyker Peking-Paris D8. But it’s always nice to have confirmation from the horses mouth and today, with a financial statement from Spyker, comes a tacit admission (or actual proof, as we like to think of it!) that our story was indeed correct. Spyker talk about the Peking-Paris in their statement, but only ever refer to it as the D8, dropping all references to the D12, which is probably as much as they’re willing to reveal until the car turns up at Frankfurt in September.