Aston Martin won’t be proclaiming ‘Powered by AMG’ on its Mercedes-engined cars

Aston Martin won’t be using ‘Powered by AMG’ badges It was a long time coming, but Aston Martin finally found a way to replace their ageing engines by doing a deal with Mercedes AMG to use their very impressive powerplants. And it seems that, depite AMG’s willingness to provide Aston Martin with modern engines, AML aren’t going to be required to put AMG badges on the bodywork or engines of their very beautiful cars. Speaking to Autocar, Mercedes boss Dieter Zetsche said that Mercedes were very happy to have done a deal with AML and equally as happy to be subtle about the arrangement.

Umea University students complete Saab collaboration project

A selection of first-year students from Sweden's Umea University have completed a 10-week collaborative design project with Saab. Tasked with exploring new directions for the brand, students were encouraged to investigate the interplay of brand and identity. Each of them was assigned a non-automotive brand to reflect on parallels that could be established between that brand and Saab, whilst also capturing the essence of the Swedish carmaker through their project's concept, its proportions, surface language, details, graphics, functionality and material choices.

Volvo V60 diesel plug-in hybrid – again

Volvo V60 Plug-in Diesel Hybrid Last month we reported on the innovative Volvo V60 diesel plug-in hybrid, a proper advance in hybrid gubbins which Volvo are planning on revealing – in practically production-ready form – at next weeks Geneva Motor Show. We first reported Volvo’s intention to bring a diesel hybrid to market by 2012 back in 2009, and the story we ran at the end of January was confirmation of that. But now Volvo has churned out a chunky press release to tell us exactly what the V60 plug-in hybrid will offer, so we thought we ought to revisit this story one more time before Geneva.