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Demise of kei cars on the horizon?

The kei car has long been a staple of the Japanese automobile industry and its car culture. Too diminutive for Western markets, the tiny cars and trucks are a strong influencer of design in Japan. Now, as The New York Times reports, the Japanese government has hit kei cars with increases in sales tax, gasoline prices and has reduced the kei car tax break introduced to make the cars popular in the first place by 50 percent.

2014 MINI John Cooper Works Concept revealed ahead of Detroit debut

The 2014 MINI John Cooper Works Concept (pictured) will debut in Detroit next month The new MINI was revealed just last month, and it sounds the gong for the start of the race to churn out as many variants on the MINI as BMW can manage. And the first of what will be many variants to come of the new MINI is this – the new MINI John Cooper Works Concept – revealed this morning ahead of a debut in a few weeks at the 2014 Detroit Auto Show. MINI aren’t letting on what’s under the bonnet of the new MINI JCW, but it seems almost certain it will be a more powerful version of the new 2.0 litre petrol for the Cooper S, which gets 189bhp in the Coopper S but will doubtless get something north of 200bhp in the new JCW.

2014 BMW X3 Facelift and more efficient engines

The 2014 BMW X3 (pictured) gets a facelift and new engines The current version of the BMW X3 SUV has been with us for more than three years, so BMW are giving it a bit of a mid-cycle facelift and more frugal engines to keep the X3 on top of its – very successful – game. Engines on offer for the 2014 X3 include the 2.0 litre diesel in the sDrive18d which offers 148bhp and 56.8mpg and the 187bhp in the X3 xDrive20d which returns 52.3mpg, the xDrive30d – which gets the 3.0 litre diesel unit – with 254bhp and 47.9mpg and the X3 xDrive35 which has an impressive 309bhp but still manages official economy of 47.1mpg. When it comes to the cosmetic facelift bits, BMW hasn’t really pushed the boat out, but the new X3 does get a new headlight design which is sleeker, new front and rear bumpers and a new surround for the kidney grill, which all contrive to make the new X3 look even more like a baby X5.