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GM CEO Rick Wagoner just showed up to Capitol Hill driving the Chevy Volt mule. No clue where the other CEOs are. We kind of hope the Chrysler Aspen hybrid carrying Bob "The Builder" Nardelli made it. Ford CEO Alan Mulally may have accidentally gone to the Senate Armed Services Committee, so someone should check up on him. But, according to Wagoner, there's one overwhelming reason why America needs to save their automakers: "It's very important for the U.S. to have a home team in the global auto industry..." Photo Credit: Win McNamee / Getty Images News
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We spent the night reading the the not-so-Big Three's business plans presented yesterday to Congress and after we graded them below, we've one huge question. Given the Carpocalypse , what's with the overwhelmingly optimistic sales projections for the next three years? The biggest factor into how well a cash loan will work with the automakers will be the number of total auto sales in the United States. If an automaker makes the right projections they should be able to figure out how much money they'll need to get them through this downturn. So how did they each do in their projections? Let's take a look and grade them. Here are the sale projections from the three automakers: Ford U.S. Total Vehicle Sales Projections (Slightly Improved Rate / Current Rate / Worse Rate) 2009: 12.5 / 11.0 / 10.5 million units 2010: 14.5 / 12.5 / 11.0 million units 2011: 15.5 / 14.0 / 12.0 million units Analysis: Yesterday on CNBC, we said we were unimpressed with Ford's submitted business...
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We spent the night reading the the not-so-Big Three's business plans presented yesterday to Congress and after we graded them below, we've one huge question. Given the Carpocalypse , what's with the overwhelmingly optimistic sales projections for the next three years? The biggest factor into how well a cash loan will work with the automakers will be the number of total auto sales in the United States. If an automaker makes the right projections they should be able to figure out how much money they'll need to get them through this downturn. So how did they each do in their projections? Let's take a look and grade them. Here are the sale projections from the three automakers: Ford U.S. Total Vehicle Sales Projections (Slightly Improved Rate / Current Rate / Worse Rate) 2009: 12.5 / 11.0 / 10.5 million units 2010: 14.5 / 12.5 / 11.0 million units 2011: 15.5 / 14.0 / 12.0 million units Analysis: Yesterday on CNBC, we said we were unimpressed with Ford's submitted business...
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We just received a hot-off-the-wires report from the WSJ that the UAW is currently in talks with some of the not-so-Big Three to kill the "Jobs Bank" program. The program, a bane of contention by everyone but the UAW and it's membership since the inception of unionized labor at automakers, basically pays workers when they're not working. Good for the membership? Sure. Good for the automakers? Not so much. Good for everyone's image? Not in the least. Although UAW officials and their allies counter the banks have been an effective way to keep a flexible job pool available and allow the companies to implement new technology while reducing overall numbers responsibly. More view that as complete hogwash. Not much is known as of yet about specifics on the discussions. As of now we've only got a wire service report from the Journal telling us: "The United Auto Workers union is in talks with some of Detroit's Big Three auto makers to stop a program that pays idled...
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Saturday Night Live took on the not-so-Big Three's congressional testimony and "jetpooling" incident in this weekend's "cold open," and unfortunately fell into the trap of shamelessly mocking tired stereotypes. Which is sad, because we'd watched SNL take on a new level of relevancy as of late thanks to the uber-adorable Tina Fey and an election season devoid of real political commentary. That's not to say watching Will Forte as Rick Wagoner, Darrell Hammond as Bob "The Builder" Nardelli and Jason Sudeikis as Alan Mulally isn't funny, but hearing about quality issues on the upcoming Ford Fiesta and a Cadillac XLR-V is a bit ol' and busted if you ask us. Now quality issues on a Chrysler 300C? That's comedic genius. But hackneyed and tired jokes aside, we were more concerned with further evidence the automakers have done the world's worst job of getting their message out. newVideoPlayer("/SNL_Open.flv", 506, 423,""...
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Saturday Night Live took on the not-so-Big Three's congressional testimony and "jetpooling" incident in this weekend's "cold open," and unfortunately fell into the trap of shamelessly mocking tired stereotypes. Which is sad, because we'd watched SNL take on a new level of relevancy as of late thanks to the uber-adorable Tina Fey and an election season devoid of real political commentary. That's not to say watching Will Forte as Rick Wagoner, Darrell Hammond as Bob "The Builder" Nardelli and Jason Sudeikis as Alan Mulally isn't funny, but hearing about quality issues on the upcoming Ford Fiesta and a Cadillac XLR-V is a bit ol' and busted if you ask us. Now quality issues on a Chrysler 300C? That's comedic genius. But hackneyed and tired jokes aside, we were more concerned with further evidence the automakers have done the world's worst job of getting their message out. newVideoPlayer("/SNL_Open.flv", 506, 423,""...
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Saturday Night Live took on the not-so-Big Three's congressional testimony and "jetpooling" incident in this weekend's "cold open," and unfortunately fell into the trap of shamelessly mocking tired stereotypes. Which is sad, because we'd watched SNL take on a new level of relevancy as of late thanks to the uber-adorable Tina Fey and an election season devoid of real political commentary. That's not to say watching Will Forte as Rick Wagoner, Darrell Hammond as Bob "The Builder" Nardelli and Jason Sudeikis as Alan Mulally isn't funny, but hearing about quality issues on the upcoming Ford Fiesta and a Cadillac XLR-V is a bit ol' and busted if you ask us. Now quality issues on a Chrysler 300C? That's comedic genius. But hackneyed and tired jokes aside, we were more concerned with further evidence the automakers have done the world's worst job of getting their message out. newVideoPlayer("/SNL_Open.flv", 506, 423,""...
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Saturday Night Live took on the not-so-Big Three's congressional testimony and "jetpooling" incident in this weekend's "cold open," and unfortunately fell into the trap of shamelessly mocking tired stereotypes. Which is sad, because we'd watched SNL take on a new level of relevancy as of late thanks to the uber-adorable Tina Fey and an election season devoid of real political commentary. That's not to say watching Will Forte as Rick Wagoner, Darrell Hammond as Bob "The Builder" Nardelli and Jason Sudeikis as Alan Mulally isn't funny, but hearing about quality issues on the upcoming Ford Fiesta and a Cadillac XLR-V is a bit ol' and busted if you ask us. Now quality issues on a Chrysler 300C? That's comedic genius. But hackneyed and tired jokes aside, we were more concerned with further evidence the automakers have done the world's worst job of getting their message out. newVideoPlayer("/SNL_Open.flv", 506, 423,""...
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If you hadn't noticed yet, Tweedle-dee, Tweedle-dumb and Tweedle-how-stupid-are-you-to-take-a- fleet-of-jets and their scary Op-Eds haven't done anything to Save GM or either of the other not-so-Big Three. The Senate is not pleased with their behavior. But here comes Mitt Romney, "favorite son" of Michigan. The guy who took tons of auto-exec money and said this before the Michigan primary: galleryPost('mittrompander', 6, 'Do You Think He Is Saying Anything About Bankruptcy?'); "I want to bring Michigan back. I am not willing to sit back and say 'too bad for Michigan, too bad for the car industry, too bad for the people who lost their jobs, they are gone forever.' I will not rest when I am president of the United States until Michigan is brought back." January is a long time ago in Romneyville as Mitt said this in the NY Times earlier this week: IF General Motors, Ford and Chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday...
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newVideoPlayer("/Obama_Hybrid_Cars_2.flv", 506, 423,""); Barack Obama took time away from talking about his mother-in-law and a college football playoff system to talk about the automaker bailout in an interview on CBS' 60 Minutes . While admitting Detroit needs help, he said it's important to make sure it's conditioned on the stakeholders (labor, suppliers, execs) coming up with a plan for a sustainable domestic auto industry as opposed to just giving out "a bridge loan to nowhere." Oh, yes, he went there. This was taped before the scary GM video , which at the very least we're hoping, convinced him to buy a Save GM t-shirt .
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MSNBC is reporting President-current Bush has said he'll consider amending the $25 billion automaker low-interest loan guarantee program to allow the automakers to get the money right now and use it for whatever they need. The decision is being made because many economists say helping US automakers is a big part of preventing the economy from going even further into the hole. This comes a day after would-be Detroit savior President-elect Barack Obama, who has said an automaker bailout is super important , met with President Bush to discuss steps he'd like to see taken, including part two of his three-part economic strategy — help for the auto industry . Why the sudden change from the Bush administration? According to the NY Times , the President would consider signing a stimulus package and help out the auto industry if Obama dropped his opposition to a free-trade agreement with Colombia. Maybe. Mr. Bush indicated at the meeting that he might support some aid and a broader...
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As if the late-breaking Friday night news of merger talks between Chrysler and GM weren't astonishing enough, Bill "Pickles" Vlasic at the New York Times continued the onslaught of amazement with a follow-up story that GM had initially approached Ford before speaking to Chrysler. Apparently, GM execs approached Ford about a possible merger in July but Ford rejected the idea despite the talks progressing until as late as last month. And we though it was hard creating a name for a merger of GM and Chrysler — try coming up with one for Ford and GM. Best we could come up with was "Big Blue Moval." But we digress. The talks apparently involved several meetings between the General's big bossman, "Slick" Rick Wagoner and its president, Fritz "Free Money" Henderson. On the Ford side of the table was Bill "Willie Style" Ford; and its CEO, Alan "Boeing-Boeing" Mulally, according to the Times . Ford spokesman Mark "News...
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The Detroit News ' own most original, free-thinking business writer, Danny "Boy" Howes, has managed to say exactly what Wert said on CNBC the other day without actually saying anything about Wert. Whether Howes was inspired while watching CNBC Friday or his opinions came to him in a dream, carried forth perhaps by dragon-messenger , we'll never know, but it's now conventional wisdom to those in the know that the Detroit Three's requested governmental cash assistance is not, in fact, a bailout — but will likely be spun as such by the rest of the media landscape. So, when your blowhard relatives start screaming about "another Detroit bailout," just remember to mumble "Bear Stearns" under your breath while clearing your throat. [ Detroit News ; Photo Credit: Markfive ]
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In a stringer piece for the Detroit News , Rex Roy makes the observation that automatic transmissions are finally beginning to catch up to stick shifts in fuel economy. While we say "it's about damn time," considering automatics make up more than 90% of the US new vehicle market, we simultaneously lament that same fact. Also, we think photog-cum-journo Roy misses out on an important component of the improvement: The interface between engine and transmission and the technologies that make the entire powertrain system more efficient. Join us after the jump for a look at why it's not just the two extra gears in your slushbox doing all the work. The first thing that had to happen for automatics to get closer to manuals in fuel economy was an improvement in automatic transmission design. Advances like variable line pressure and the addition of more than four forward gears were far too long in coming to mass-market vehicles in this country. But, five- and six-speed autoboxes...
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We're constantly harping on American companies for not bringing over their European cars, but with news that Ford is doing just that , the question has new immediacy. The British Motor Show is a good place to start. The show will witness the debut of the Ford Focus RS , which speaks to a rally heritage we don't have but sorely need. Maybe it's the technology, or maybe we just want the diesel versions of cars we already have. Given how long we've lusted after Mondeos and notchbacked Insignias , we're almost at a loss to think of what we'd want first. That's where you can help. What European cars do we need and want most? We'll count the American arms of European car companies to expand the field a bit.
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