More Power! Get the details on the potent Porsche 911 GT3 RS 4.0

Porsche has ramped up the already heady performance of the 911 GT3 RS through the adoption of a new, naturally aspirated 4.0-liter version of the company's sturdy, horizontally opposed flat six-cylinder engine. The unit kicks out 50 hp more than the 3.8-liter six-cylinder used in the existing 911 GT3 RS. This mill claims 500 hp at 8,250 rpm, a figure which makes the speedster the most powerful naturally aspirated road-going version of the 911 ever.

Carlos Ghosn's automaker mantra: Go big or you'll go away

Size matters in auto company survival, Renault and Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn told an audience in Detroit on Tuesday. To cope with the escalating costs and scope of a global industry, successful automakers must complete a trifecta--be able to compete in every technology, every market and every segment, Ghosn said during a luncheon speech at the Detroit Economic Club “No 3 million-unit carmaker can make it,” Ghosn said, explaining why his Renault-Nissan alliance forged an alliance with Germany's Daimler AG. Competency in one or two of the three skills is not enough, and only very large companies can afford all three, he said.

Back to basics for VW, says Walter de Silva

By Adam Towler Motor Industry 25 June 2008 13:01 It was an odd place for an inside line into what future Volkswagens will look like, but when head of VW Group design Walter de Silva invited CAR to the old Fiat Lingotto factory in Turin - now a conference and shopping centre – we could hardly say no. De Silva described VW as being immersed in a 'process of defining their design language' which could be read as ‘we’re still sucking our designer thumbs to see what happens’. Audi, De Silva said, had already been through that process and its design DNA was ‘understood by everyone in the company, right down to the smallest details'.