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Mini Vision concept: what does it say about the brand's future?

The sight of Mini design head Anders Warming presenting a holographic, 3D projection of the Mini Vision concept as if appearing in his own cartoon was certainly a new one on us, but it captured the quirky, slightly left-field image the subsidiary of BMW Group has cultivated since its relaunch 13 years ago. As the 'Vision' tag suggests, this is billed as a marker of intent for the brand's future design direction rather than a pre-production teaser of the new Mini hatchback (Cooper in most markets) we'll see later this year. However if the third-generation 'new' Mini doesn't look remarkably similar we'd be amazed, such is the level of productionized detailing on this purely digital model.

Ford Marks 30 Years Of Diesel Power

THE MIGHTY Blue Oval is marking 30 years of diesel power this year. 1984 saw the introduction of Ford’s derv-powered Fiesta and, to illustrate the power of the black pump, the firm now sells almost 119,000 of them. According to the carmaker, today diesel power represents 38.5 per cent of all Ford car sales, making the introduction of its first mainstream diesel car a significant landmark.

Kia styling chief Schreyer is fluent in Koreapean

The way Peter Schreyer sees it, there is one key difference between European and Korean automakers: Europeans design from the heart, Koreans from the head. "In a European company, everybody is a car driver, a car enthusiast," says the Germany-born design chief of Kia Motors Corp. "Everybody from the CEO to the little designer to people on the production line, they want to build cars they want to drive themselves." Koreans can be more market-oriented: "They look at the big picture, which markets to explore or conquer.