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EV maker Coda trims staff

Not much more could go wrong for electric-car maker Coda, which has struggled to sell its four-door EV in the United States since officially launching it here in March. But Web reports, first seen at www.plugincars.com, say the company laid off 50 employees, or 15 percent of its workforce, last week, mostly in the sales and marketing departments. Efforts by Autoweek to contact Coda have not been successful.

Bentley Continental Estate – Carrazzeria to make a Bentley Shooting Brake

The Bentley Continental Shooting Brake by Carrozzeria A week or two back we got the sniff that Italian Coachbuilders Carrozzeria Touring Superleggera where planning on building a limited run car based on the Bentley Continental. The rumours were vague – even from Carrozzeria who simply stated “Inspired by the success and the extraordinary characteristics of Bentley automobiles, Carrozzeria Touring Superleggera of Milan, with the support of Bentley Motors Limited, developed and built a fascinating new coach built Bentley, faithful to its long tradition of Italian coach building.” Which told us not a whole lot. But we now know that what Carrazzeria are planning is a Bentley Continental Shooting Brake – effectively a Bentley Continental GT Estate.

Interior Motives China Conference to explore new design directions

Chinese consumers are driving new design directions, and CDN's Interior Motives China Conference in Beijing next week is set to explore how. Titled ‘New brands and the search for a design identity', the conference features an impressive speaker line-up that blends the international (Chris Bangle and VW's Wolfgang Muller Pietralla) with the regional (GM PATAC's Friedhelm Engler, Ford China's Chelsia Lau and PSA-Peugeot/Citroën China's Robert Walker), with the domestic (Shan Wei of the Beijing Automotive Technical Center (BATC), and Ken Ma of SAIC). The annual conference is the third in China to be hosted by CDN's magazine Interior Motives, and will be held on Wednesday 21 April, and Thursday 22 April, just in advance of the opening of Auto China 2010 in Beijing on Friday (23 April).