Volvo Concept You – the future Volvo

Volvo Concept You - Volvo's future direction We have to confess that we weren’t huge fans of the Volvo Concept Universe at Shanghai this year, but the Frankfurt offering – the Volvo Concept You – is more convincing. The Concept Universe at Shanghai was just a bit too much ‘East meets West’ in design, with the feeling that it was just not quite the right direction for a new, more upmarket Volvo to follow. But the Concept You is more convincing.

Smart Fortwo Lightshine launches

Yet another Smart Limited Edition - the Smart Fortwo Lightshine You have to hand it to Mercedes – they don’t give up on Smart (or Maybach – another expensive departure). They keep churning out new cars (well, endless new limited editions, anyway) despite sales that seem to keep falling. Last year (2010) saw Smart sales in the UK fall by 8.5% and their sales last month (December 2010) were a woeful 57% down on December 2009.

Chevy Volt will do 230mpg

GM are claiming 230 mpg for the Chevy Volt The premise is that the vast majority of buyers for the Chevy Volt will do no more than 40 miles a day. Which just happens to be the range that the Volt has. So I suppose they could have worked out the cost of the electricity to fully charge the Volt, converted that in to the cost of petrol and come to the conclusion that it does 230mpg.