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Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer gets Ford with 1-millionth Sync system

It's taken a little more than two years for Ford to build 1 million vehicles with the Sync entertainment and communications system, and the automaker marked the milestone by having Ford CEO Alan Mulally deliver a Ford Fusion hybrid with the 1-millionth system to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. Ford also let Mulally, a former Boeing executive, make a return visit to Seattle, home to the Microsoft headquarters. Microsoft supplies the software that is the heart of the Sync system.

Aston Martin Rapide S: The video

Ahead of the media launch of the Aston Martin Rapide S in Spain, Aston Martin has delivered a Rapide S video to pique interest. Now we have the arrival of the Aston Martin Rapide S as a replacement for the Rapide, which goes a similar route to the DB9 with a more a aggressive attitude and more power. Aston Martin revealed the Rapide S in January in an effort to inject some oomph in to Rapide sales – as a replacement for the Rapide and not as an ‘S’ model to sit above it – bestowing it with 550bhp instead of the Rapide’s 470bhp, chucking in a new grill and boot spoiler and a set of the Gen 4 tweaks like adaptive dampers.

Electric cars get a £500 million government cash boost – but will it get spent?

The new BMW i3 EV (pictured) will be subsidised until 2017. The subsidy of up to £5000 paid to buyers of electric cars has been with us for three years, but it hasn’t had much impact on EV sales and it did look like the government had decided to scrap it all together. But it looks like the coalition has allowed Nick Clegg to have his way with EV subsides in a move that will see £500 million injected in to promoting and supporting electric cars in the UK in the next few years.