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Automotive Press Association Design Panel says autonomous cars will tear up design rulebook [w/Video]

Fully autonomous cars will challenge everything we know about car design to date, according to industry experts at the Michelin Challenge Design-hosted Automotive Press Association (APA) Design Panel. The APA members-only event, held at the Detroit Athletic Club, carried the theme of 'Driven/Undriven: The Duality of Tomorrow's Automobile' – the subject of this year's Michelin Challenge Design – and explored the design challenges and opportunities that will arise with the advent of autonomous vehicles. The APA Design Panel consisted of Jim Hall of 2953 Analytics, Chris Borroni-Bird, vice president of Strategic Development at Qualcomm and author of Reinventing the Automobile: Personal Urban Mobility of the 21st Century as well as Stewart Reed, chair of the Transportation Design course at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California.

Tour of quake zone shows Akio Toyoda 'the depth of destruction'

Toyota Motor Corp. President Akio Toyoda toured Japan's earthquake disaster zone, including the damaged assembly plant opened there in January, as the world's largest automaker struggles to get a grip on the supplier crisis and resume production. Toyoda's trip on Sunday and Monday took him to Miyagi prefecture, near the epicenter of the killer March 11 quake and an area being positioned by Toyota as its domestic center for small car production.

New Mercedes SL 2012 finally unveiled officially

New Mercedes SL 2012 - finally it's official After two days of leaks on the new SL, Mercedes finally unveils the 2012 Mercedes-Benz SL officially. We’ve started each of the last two days with news of the new 2012 Mercedes SL. Tuesday saw a leak of a brochure scan of the new SL – so we had a clear idea of what was coming – and yesterday saw the arrival of a full gallery of photos of the new SL.