Ford names insider Mark Fields as to succeed outgoing CEO Alan Mulally

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US automaker Ford confirmed Thursday that veteran insider Mark Fields will replace Alan Mulally as chief executive on 1 July.

Fields, currently Ford’s chief operating officer, had long been seen as Mulally’s heir apparent. He was centre stage at this year’s Detroit auto show unveiling the aluminium model of Ford’s best-selling F-150 pickup and a limited edition Mustang GT.

Fields, 53, is a Harvard Business School graduate who joined Ford in 1989 and ran its North American operations through the depth of the recession. Ford was the only major US automaker not to file for bankruptcy.

Mulally, 68, a long-time Boeing executive, was hired by Ford in 2006 to turn around a company making massive losses and facing declining market share. He slashed costs and mortgaged all of Ford’s assets in a move that allowed the company to steer clear of bankruptcy and government-ownership.

Fields becomes the second insider in recent months to take over one of the big American auto manufacturers. Last December General Motors named Mary Barra as its new chief executive, succeeding Dan Akerson, a turnaround specialist appointed by the US Treasury.

At a press conference, chairman Bill Ford thanked Mulally for his leadership and for the smooth leadership transition.

“We have had very few, and maybe never, have we had a planned smooth transition,” Ford said. “Alan is a hall of fame CEO, and we all know that. But most hall of fame CEOs cannot let go.”

In a statement, Ford said of Fields, “Mark has transformed several of our operations around the world into much stronger businesses during his 25 years at Ford. Now, Mark is ready to lead our company into the future as CEO.”



Fields faces some major issues as he moves into the top job. Last week Ford announced its first-quarter profits were down 39% from the same period last year, hit by higher warranty costs and South American currency losses. The company also faces issues in Europe, where a sluggish economy and restructuring costs are still taking a toll, and in Russia, a country Ford has invested in heavily, as the political crisis over Ukraine intensifies.

However Ford still expects to make a pre-tax profit of between $7bn and $8bn this year. In 2006 Ford lost $12.7bn. “Alan deservedly will be long remembered for engineering one of the most successful business turnarounds in history,” Ford said.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/may/01/ford-names-mark-fields-ceo-mulally-auto

BMW heading for record year after Chinese demand drives up profits

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BMW sales rose 8.7% in the first three months of the year to a new high of 487,024 units. Photograph: Miguel Villagran/Getty Images

BMW is heading for a record year after surging Chinese demand for its cars helped to drive profits higher in the first quarter.

The German high-end carmaker said it was on course to sell more than 2m vehicles in a year for the first time.

Sales rose 8.7% in the first three months of the year to a new high of 487,024 units. Pre-tax profit jumped 8.1% to €2.17bn (£1.78bn).

In Asia, sales increased 22% to 158,582, powered by China where orders jumped by a quarter to 108,143. Chinese sales outstripped those for the Americas, where BMW sold 99,840 cars â€" up 3.5%.

BMW's chairman, Norbert Reithofer, said: "We are on course to achieve significant sales volume growth in the current year, leading to a new all-time high of over 2m vehicles. We are aiming for a new record group profit before tax figure, which will be significantly higher than in the previous year."

Sales of BMW-branded cars rose 12% to 428,259 while sales of its luxury Rolls-Royce marque jumped 40% to 897.

Demand was high for Phantom and Ghost Rolls-Royce cars, and orders were strong for the new Wraith model, BMW said. All the cars are built at the Rolls-Royce division's factory at Goodwood in Sussex.



Mini sales fell by 12% in the first quarter but BMW said this was expected because the brand's main model, the Hatch, was updated in March. Interest in the new Hatch, manufactured in Oxford, was high and would feed in to strong sales from the summer, it said.



Reithofer said BMW had increased profits while spending more on product development and staff and in the face of strong competition.

BMW increased its workforce by almost 5,000 to 111,378 from a year earlier as the group hired engineers and skilled workers to meet demand for its cars and to work on new technologies.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/may/06/bmw-heading-record-year-chinese-demand-sales-profits

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If you are ready to ship your car, let us know today by visiting our site or calling us for your free quote.

Ford names insider Mark Fields as to succeed outgoing CEO Alan Mulally

Prepared for some more automotive information? We have a good short article today that you should actually review. Stay up to this day with all vehicle related details and automobile transport information right here.

US automaker Ford confirmed Thursday that veteran insider Mark Fields will replace Alan Mulally as chief executive on 1 July.

Fields, currently Ford’s chief operating officer, had long been seen as Mulally’s heir apparent. He was centre stage at this year’s Detroit auto show unveiling the aluminium model of Ford’s best-selling F-150 pickup and a limited edition Mustang GT.

Fields, 53, is a Harvard Business School graduate who joined Ford in 1989 and ran its North American operations through the depth of the recession. Ford was the only major US automaker not to file for bankruptcy.

Mulally, 68, a long-time Boeing executive, was hired by Ford in 2006 to turn around a company making massive losses and facing declining market share. He slashed costs and mortgaged all of Ford’s assets in a move that allowed the company to steer clear of bankruptcy and government-ownership.

Fields becomes the second insider in recent months to take over one of the big American auto manufacturers. Last December General Motors named Mary Barra as its new chief executive, succeeding Dan Akerson, a turnaround specialist appointed by the US Treasury.

At a press conference, chairman Bill Ford thanked Mulally for his leadership and for the smooth leadership transition.

“We have had very few, and maybe never, have we had a planned smooth transition,” Ford said. “Alan is a hall of fame CEO, and we all know that. But most hall of fame CEOs cannot let go.”



In a statement, Ford said of Fields, “Mark has transformed several of our operations around the world into much stronger businesses during his 25 years at Ford. Now, Mark is ready to lead our company into the future as CEO.”

Fields faces some major issues as he moves into the top job. Last week Ford announced its first-quarter profits were down 39% from the same period last year, hit by higher warranty costs and South American currency losses. The company also faces issues in Europe, where a sluggish economy and restructuring costs are still taking a toll, and in Russia, a country Ford has invested in heavily, as the political crisis over Ukraine intensifies.



However Ford still expects to make a pre-tax profit of between $7bn and $8bn this year. In 2006 Ford lost $12.7bn. “Alan deservedly will be long remembered for engineering one of the most successful business turnarounds in history,” Ford said.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/may/01/ford-names-mark-fields-ceo-mulally-auto

Google: driverless cars now have better understanding of city driving

Ready for some even more vehicle news? We have a great article today that you need to really read. Stay up to this day with all automobile related information and auto transport information right here.

Google explains its driverless cars.

Google is getting closer to its dream of developing a marketable driverless car. The search company said on Monday it had improved the software in its eye-catching project, to take greater account of city driving.

Google’s robot cars have now driven 700,000 miles around Mountain View in California, where the tech company is headquartered.

The company announced that its latest software includes:



• More comprehensive and detailed maps to include curbs and different types of traffic signals.

• Improvements in detecting objects around the vehicle â€" classifying pedestrians and cyclists separately from moving vehicles because they follow different rules of the road.

• The ability to “read” signs as they appear and not just in specific locations â€" for example, a stop sign unfolding from the side of a school bus.

• Modelling likely situations â€" Google has developed software that measure the probability of what is likely to happen in thousands of everyday driving situations.

In a blogpost, the company said:

As it turns out, what looks chaotic and random on a city street to the human eye is actually fairly predictable to a computer. As we’ve encountered thousands of different situations, we’ve built software models of what to expect, from the likely (a car stopping at a red light) to the unlikely (blowing through it). We still have lots of problems to solve, including teaching the car to drive more streets in Mountain View [Google’s home town] before we tackle another town, but thousands of situations on city streets that would have stumped us two years ago can now be navigated autonomously.

Google has equipped about two dozen Lexus RX450H SUVs with its prototype technology, which include sensors that create 3D maps of the cars' surroundings in real time.

The cars are tested with a driver in the driver's seat, ready to take control if anything goes wrong, and a Google engineer in the passenger seat.

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/apr/28/google-driverless-cars-city-driving

General Motors' first quarter profits plunge after major product recall

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The ignition switch of a 2005 Chevrolet Cobalt, manufactured by General Motors. Photograph: Molly Riley/AP

First quarter profits at General Motors have plunged by 88% as the US-based carmaker was hit by a $1.3bn (£774m) charge to cover the cost of a major product recall.

The company, which manufactures brands such as Cadillac and Chevrolet, plus Vauxhall at Ellesmere Port and Luton, also took a $300m hit for restructuring parts of its European business.

"Obviously, the recall campaign charges in the first quarter overshadows the headline results, but if you look underneath that, we had strong performance across the board," said Chuck Stevens, GM's chief financial officer.

But he insisted it was too early to say whether the vehicle manufacturer would need to take further financial charges over defective ignition switches which have been linked to at least 13 deaths.

GM reported net income during the first three months of 2014 of $125m, compared with $865m in the same period last year, while sales rose to $37.4bn, up from $36.9bn in 2013.



Analysts said it was GM's worst quarterly performance since it unveiled a net loss after leaving bankruptcy protection in 2009, but many had been expecting worse and its shares fell only 1.5%.

"It should be good enough to ease concerns," Citi analyst Itay Michaeli told Reuters. "Expectations were very low. People were just kind of nervous overall about how the quarter would look. The story really here though, in terms of fundamentals, is better performance in the international regions."



GM was until 2011 the biggest car seller in the world but it has been knocked off the top spot by Japan's Toyota. The latter has just announced first quarter sales bigger than GM and Volkswagen, the German contender for the top spot, after soaring sales in China.

In North America GM experienced higher than expected sales of its more lucrative versions of the redesigned Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra full-size pickup trucks.

"The performance of our core operations was very strong this quarter, reflecting the positive response of customers to the new vehicles we are bringing to market," said Mary Barra, the company's chief executive .

"Our focus remains on creating the world's best vehicles with the highest levels of safety, quality and customer service, while aggressively addressing our business opportunities and challenges globally," she added.

Some GM ignition switches have made vehicle engines stall and stopped airbags from working while halting the use of power steering and brakes.

The company is under investigation by US safety regulators, Congress and the department of justice over its failure to detect the faulty part for more than a decade. There have been calls from some quarters for GM to set up a victim compensation fund.

Of the $1.3bn to cover the various recalls in the first quarter, GM said about $700m was related to the defective ignition switches, including $300m to cover the cost of courtesy cars for owners who do not want to drive the cars affected by the recall switch.

The loss in Europe widened to $284m from $152m last year, but the quarter included $200m in restructuring costs already outlined by the company. Stevens said GM was seeing real progress in Europe and still believed financial results there would return to break even by the middle of the decade.

In the past there have been concerns that GM's factories at Ellesmere Port on Merseyside and Luton in Bedfordshire could close. The latter lost its car manufacturing more than a decade ago and now only makes vans. Two years ago the future of Ellesmere Port was assured until at least 2020 after it was chosen to build a new generation of Astra cars.

GM, like many other global car companies, was badly hit by the 2008 financial crisis, which led to a massive downturn in consumer spending. The group was put into court-assisted Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2009 and later re-emerged as a going concern after public money was pumped into the business.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/apr/24/general-motors-first-quarter-profits-plunge-product-recall

Jeep's sales keep climbing in Japan

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SUV specialist solidifies standing as country's No. 1 American brand

SUV specialist solidifies standing as country's No. 1 American brand



Jeep promoted its four-wheeling prowess on an off-road course called Stuckland in the foothills of Mount Fuji.

TOKYO -- As other U.S. brands struggle in Japan, Jeep is forging ahead to its fifth straight year of sales increases and a solidified, if unlikely, spot as the No. 1 American brand here.

Jeep sales climbed 56 percent to 1,868 vehicles in the first three months of 2014 and are expected to eclipse 8,000 for the full year and 10,000 in 2015, Chrysler Group's local operation predicts.

Business will get a boost from May's introduction of the redesigned Cherokee and next year's arrival of the Renegade.

The numbers may seem small, but they are a victory in Japan, where import brands still account for just 5 percent of the market. And Jeep, surprisingly in a country that loves small cars and hybrids, is tops among American brands, outselling bigger mass-market compatriots such as Ford and Chevrolet.

"The positioning is very clear," says Pontus Haggstrom, CEO of Fiat Chrysler Japan. "We do only SUVs and we do them well."



Fiat factor

Jeep's success also underscores how Fiat S.p.A.'s 2009 tie-up and eventual takeover of Chrysler has had global repercussions. In China, for instance, Jeep will return to local manufacturing next year, thanks to a local joint venture with Guangzhou Automobile Group Co. brokered partly by Fiat.

In Japan, Jeep's dealership footprint expanded when existing Fiat dealers picked up Chrysler and Jeep franchises. Says Haggstrom: "It allowed us to expand the network quite quickly."



Jeep now has 63 dealerships in Japan, compared with 50 only 18 months ago. The goal is to grow to 90 outlets within two years.

Jeep passed Ford as the best-selling U.S. brand in Japan in 2012.

Through March of this year, Jeep sold 1,868 units here, compared with Ford's 1,506. Chevrolet, the No. 3 U.S. marque here, sold just 328 units.

Jeep's goal of more than 10,000 units next year would put it within striking distance of the record 14,500 it sold in 1996, a year when all U.S.-made vehicles benefited from a favorable currency rate. That's not true today.

This year, Jeep is expected to displace Fiat as Fiat Chrysler's best selling brand in Japan. The group also sells Alfa Romeo and Chrysler in Japan and positions Abarth as a stand-alone brand.

Right-hand steering helps

It helps that Jeep fits all models with right-hand steering, a feat not yet mastered by such foreign rivals as General Motors.

Jeep also homologates its vehicles for Japan at the U.S. factory instead of the port of entry.

At a recent weeklong roadshow, Jeep promoted its four-wheeling prowess at a mud-soaked off-road course called Stuckland in the foothills of Mount Fuji. Executives enjoyed joking that their Jeeps weren't getting stuck at Stuckland.

Corporate sibling brand Chrysler, however, is having a harder time gaining traction. The brand was revived here in December 2012, after a four-year moratorium on new product.

Dodge pulled out at the same time.

Today, Chrysler sells only the 300 sedan and Chrysler Ypsilon, a rebadged version of the Lancia Ypsilon minicar. Its sales are expected to hold flat around 1,000 units this year, Haggstrom says.

Unlike Jeep, which is bolstering its lineup, Chrysler has no other products in its lineup suitable for Japan, Haggstrom says.

Still, even Chrysler's modest results mark progress. Notes Haggstrom: "Two years ago there were zero sales from Chrysler."

You can reach Hans Greimel at hgreimel@crain.com. -- Follow Hans on

http://www.autonews.com/article/20140503/GLOBAL02/305059995/jeeps-sales-keep-climbing-in-japan