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Crunch watch Mar 09: the auto industry in crisis

By Ben Pulman and Tim Pollard Motor Industry 31 March 2009 13:48 Tuesday 31 March 2009• Porsche said that its earnings before tax rose to €7.3 billion in the six months to the end of January – including a €6.8bn windfall from its VW share options (Financial Times)• Fritz Henderson, GM's president and chief operating officer, will step up to replace Rick Wagoner, who was ousted on Sunday as CEO of General Motors (Financial Times)• President Obama is essentially CEO-in-chief of GM – despite not owning a single cent of stock, says Detroit News commentator (Detroit News)• German chancellor Angela Merkel gives assurances that any would-be investors in GM's European arm will be given state support. Opel is asking for €3.3 billion in aid – and up to 25,000 jobs in Germany depend on it, with up to 300,000 jobs across Europe including Saab and Vauxhall (BBC News)Monday 30 March 2009• General Motors' chief executive Rick Wagoner has been ordered to resign by US president Barack Obama with immediate effect. It's part of Obama's administration's critique of GM and Chrysler's turnaround plans – he's understood to be unhappy with the plans submitted (BBC News)• New GM non-executive chairman Kent Kresa has admitted that at the company's next general meeting it will have 'a majority of new directors' (General Motors)• Chrysler will receive US government aid for the next 30 days, but the Obama administration has said that if the company cannot secure a tie-up with the Fiat Group within that time period it will not receive any more money from the taxpayers and could go into liquidation.

2013 BMW Z4 Facelift & Z4 sDrive18i revealed

BMW has given the Z4 the smallest of facelifts for 2013 and added a new model – the BMW Z4 sDrive18i. Arrives April 2013. All that’s really changed is a slightly different set of LED headlights and some new alloy options, with the smallest of detail changes to the trim on the interior.

Aston Martin Rapide interior shots surface

This appears to be the first official image of the interior of the Aston Martin Rapide So it’s no real surprise, with the Aston Martin Rapide actually getting to the point of being production ready, that shots (or renderings, probably) have surfaced. We had ‘official’ shots of the Aston Martin Rapide in April, and now we have an interior shot. Not the biggest – or most enlightening – shot, but they do seem to be real, rather than the work of an enthusiastic amateur Photoshopper.