Back in 2008/2009 during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC), two of the Big Three were close to failure. General Motors recreated itself and left its bad debts with the older entity whilst Chrysler, having left the DaimlerChrysler group in 2007 was struggling with its new owners Cerebus Capital Management. The timing of that transaction probably saved Daimler Benz during the … [Read more...]
Waymo to Build Complete Autonomous Vehicles
Back in January it was reported that Waymo was partnering with Magna, the contract vehicle builder, to start assembling full autonomous vehicles in Michigan. Magna, based in Canada now owns Magna Steyr, an Austrian company that used to build their own cars however in the last few decades has been building cars for others including Jaguar. At the time, the Michigan Economic … [Read more...]
De Soto
Back in the 1920s and 30s the major American brands all looked to soak up the differing and growing market segments. Chrysler bought the Dodge Brothers company and also created a second brand to target the mid range price point. This article is about this creation, named after Hernandez De Soto, a Spanish explorer of the 16th Century. The original De Soto was the first … [Read more...]
FCA Attempts To Stop Mahindra Selling in US
Some words start out as a product name (a noun) and end up as a verb - a word to describe a function or work process. This is known as "anthimeria", the act of using a word in a new grammatical form. In my youth, several stood out: you could Hoover the carpet or Xerox a document (I’m really showing my age). Today you Google something when you search online or you Photoshop an … [Read more...]
Sunbeam-Talbot-Darracq
Here on Motoring Weekly we have written about all three parts of this entity and this grouping of marques didn’t last that long in an industry that was hit by the Great Depression of the late 1920s and was constantly evolving with smaller companies either going bust or being gobbled up by larger conglomerates. The three companies had an interesting evolution of their own … [Read more...]
