Short news automotive

Oct-11-2012 By : agxadmin

  • Fiat started sales of its first locally-made Viaggio compact. The car will be available from CNY108,800, said Jiang Ping, Executive Vice General Manager of Fiat’s joint venture with Guangzhou Automobile Group Co.
  • Shanghai’s car plate prices hit a record high in September as the average price shot up to CNY66,425, CNY3,866 more than in August, while the lowest successful bid rose CNY3,600 to CNY65,700, the Shanghai Commodity International Auction Co said. Plate prices increased even though the auction attracted the fewest number of bidders this year – 19,114 people – down 10% on the previous month. Since July, the holding period for a car plate was extended from one to three years, pushing some scalpers out of the market. 9,500 car plates were available for bidding in September, the same as in August, July and June.
  • Harman International Industries, a world leader in audio equipment and in-car information and entertainment systems, still has great confidence in the Chinese market even though it is facing slowing growth. The increasing traffic congestion means Chinese people spend more time in their cars, and that creates a rising demand for better infotainment products and a safer driving experience. In the fiscal year to June, the company’s China sales grew 42% to USD382 million, more than double its total sales growth of 16%. Harman has located one of its four global research and development (R&D) hubs in Shanghai to meet the demand from its Chinese customers.
  • Cars with seven seats or less were exempt from highway tolls during the eight-day Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holiday. As a result, the country’s 236 million licensed drivers saved up to CNY10 billion in highway fees. Car rental firms did a brisk business and raised their prices. At Shanghai’s Dazhong Car Rental and Leasing all 4,000 cars were booked well in advance of the holiday.
  • Geely Automobile, whose parent Zhejiang Geely took over Volvo in 2010, said it was voluntarily recalling about 55,018 vehicles for defects in fuel boxes. The cars are Kingkong and Jin Ying models produced and sold in China between January 3, 2009, and November 30 last year.
  • BMW’s sales in China surged 59% in September, easing investors’ concerns that the world’s biggest vehicle market is slowing. Volkswagen’s Audi unit and Daimler’s Mercedes-Benz posted sales gains of 20% and 10%, respectively.
  • Exports of China-produced vehicles are forecast to hit one million vehicles this year from 849,500 vehicles last year. Some automotive analysts are predicting a 50% increase to 1.25 million vehicles.
  • More than 20 million new drivers obtain driving licenses each year in China, and more than 186 million people in China are licensed to drive cars. If motorcyclists are added, there are 247 million people holding licenses. Of those, nearly 11%, or around 27 million, have less than a year’s driving experience.
  • Hyundai Motor Group has set up an auto financing joint venture in China to start providing auto loans to Hyundai and Kia customers. It will own 60% of Beijing Hyundai Auto Finance Co with an initial capital of CNY500 million. Beijing Automotive Industry Group will hold the remainder. Hyundai said the new venture is aimed at tapping the growing demand from younger generations of Chinese who are more willing to borrow money to buy cars than their parents. Only 10% of car purchases are financed by loans in China, a ratio that industry estimates will triple by 2017,” Ted Chung, CEO of Hyundai Capital Services, said.
  • BYD announced that Vice President and Sales Manager Yang Longzhong – who is also one of the company’s founders – has left the company for personal reasons and as part of a restructuring. He sold a large portion of his A-shares in the company in July, which netted him CNY119 million in proceeds. Yang’s departure follows the resignation last year of Xia Zhibing, another BYD Vice President and Sales Manager of its Car Division at the time. BYD’s F3 model was once China’s best-selling car, but the company is now not even listed in China’s top 10 of car makers.
  • Tolls on China’s expressways are among the highest in the world, according to Xinhua News Agency. Tolls average about CNY1 for every two kilometers traveled.
  • Bentley Motors’ and Porsche’s China sales are expected to surpass those in the U.S. this year, said Jimmy Jin at Volkswagen headquarters in Wolfsburg, Germany. Bentley is a VW subsidiary, and Porsche owns a controlling stake in VW. “The luxury brands sell well these years in China because of new wealth,” Jin told China Daily. Bentleys sales in China have increased ten-fold within the past several years. VW sold 1.7 million vehicles in China in the first eight months of the year, raising its market share to 20.4%. Jin also predicted sales of Audis in China will surpass 400,000 units this year, up 30% from 2011.
  • General Motors said sales in China rose 1.7% in September, the slowest growth in eight months, as deliveries of Buicks dropped 1.8% and Cadillacs declined 8.3%. Deliveries of cars and minivans climbed to 244,266 units in September. GM’s total sales for the first nine months of this year to dealerships in China rose 10% to 2.08 million units. Sales of SAIC-GM-Wuling Automobile Co, the venture that makes Wuling mini commercial vehicles, gained 0.4% to 119,510 units last month. Deliveries at FAW-GM Light Commercial Vehicle Co, the venture with FAW Group Corp, fell 5% to 4,581 units.
  • China’s quality supervision authorities will increase penalties for automakers whose vehicles are recalled in the country due to problems with quality standards. Hefty fines will be imposed. Car makers which do not cooperate with the investigation can be fined up to CNY1 million. Manufacturers which fail to stop producing or selling the defective vehicles after the recall order or ignore the recall, could be fined hundreds of millions of yuan after the regulation is enforced.
  • Qoros Automotive Co, the joint venture between domestic carmaker Chery and U.S. investment firm Israel Corp, said it will debut its first product at the Geneva motor show next March and will start sales in both China and Europe simultaneously, targeting young consumers between 25 and 35 years old.
  • Eleven Chinese central government departments including the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the Ministry of Science and Technology and the Ministry of Finance, recently incorporated 23 electric vehicles in their fleets. Produced by domestic carmakers BYD and JAC Motors, the vehicles will be used in a one-year trial. China Potevia Co has built charging facilities onsite at the departments, and will maintain and charge the vehicles.
  • SAIC GM’s Pan-Asia Automotive Technology Center completed a new testing field in late September in Guangde county, Anhui province, where the joint venture will conduct R&D and vehicle testing at a site covering 5.67 square kilometers. Built with a total investment of CNY160 million, it has the longest testing track of its kind in China and is expected to boost local design and manufacturing content in GM cars made in the country.
  • Beiqi Foton Motor Co plans to build 130 dealerships in Brazil and invest another USD200 million in the next five years in addition to its USD300 million factory making light-duty trucks and minivans. The facility is scheduled to start production next year and have the capacity to make 30,000 units a year by 2017. In January, Foton began selling vehicles in Brazil through three dealers in Sao Paulo.
  • The anticipated tough new Beijing V emission standard will put more pressure on domestic carmakers, even forcing some to drop out of the Beijing market due to the high costs of upgrading their products. The emission standard — equivalent to the Euro V standard and the strictest in China — could take effect this year, although no final decision has been made. Once in force, models that can’t meet the new standard will be denied registration in Beijing. Chery Automobile Co, one of the top domestic carmakers and China’s biggest car exporter, has only two models that meet the Beijing V emission standard.
  • Anhui Jianghuai Automobile Co will start construction on November 28 in Camacari in Brazil’s state of Bahia, on a USD450 million plant, the company’s first in South America. It is expected to become operational by the end of 2014 with an annual production capacity of 100,000 units. In the first six months, Chinese vehicle exports to Brazil dived by almost 90% year-on-year, taking the country out of the top 10 export destinations for Chinese automobiles, due to the imposition of higher import taxes. The Brazilian market is dominated by Fiat and Volkswagen.
 
 

Short news automotive

Jun-14-2012 By : agxadmin

  • Chinese car dealer Zhongsheng will buy a 70% stake in German car tuning manufacturer Carlsson. The company did not disclose the size of the deal, but it was the second purchase it had made in the past three months after paying CNY1.13 billion for Loong Wah Motors – a dealer with 16 outlets and brands including Toyota and Infiniti.
  • Strong demand drove car plate prices in Shanghai to a record high for the fifth consecutive month in May to CNY64,367 — up CNY2,741 on April. The lowest successful bid increased CNY3,000 to CNY64,000, while the total number of bidders was 24,230, up 1,524 from a month earlier. The average price has increased by about CNY10,000 this year. The local government offered 9,300 plates for auction in May — the most this year and up 800 on the previous month’s quota. The city will auction off 9,500 license plates on June 16, the most this year and up 200 from last month.
  • Sino-German joint venture Shanghai Volkswagen Automotive Co held a contract signing ceremony and laid the foundation stone for a plant in Xinjiang on May 28. The plant will have an initial annual production capacity of 50,000 vehicles when it starts operation in 2014 and will be the first passenger vehicle factory in Xinjiang. Volkswagen Group and SAIC Motor Corp will together invest €170 million in the plant.  It is the company’s 7th JV plant in China. The group plans to increase combined annual capacity at its joint ventures to 3 million vehicles next year or in 2014, up from the current 2 million units.
  • In the mobile car navigation market in China, AutNavi occupies the No 1 position with 38.9%, followed by Careland’s 30.5% and Nokia’s 10.7%, according to Beijing-based Analysys. At present, AutoNavi has about 58 million mobile users, and the number is expected to hit 100 million by the end of this year. But portable navigation device firms like AutoNavi and Garmin that dominated the market for years are now facing competition from internet firms. Garmin, which provides one-third of automotive navigation devices globally, opened a new Chinese headquarters in Shanghai last month.
  • BMW opened a design studio and a technical configuration center in Shanghai to provide solutions to product, transportation, automotive, environmental and interaction design. The center will develop BMW’s ConnectedDrive functions aimed specifically at BMW’s Chinese customers.
  • Toyota Motor Corp opened its seventh Chinese vehicle plant in Changchun, Jilin province. The Japanese carmaker’s joint venture in China, Sichuan-FAW-Toyota, invested CNY4 billion in the project, which covers an area of 970,000 square meters. With an initial production capacity of 100,000 units each year, the plant will make Toyota’s Corolla.
  • Italian brake producer Brembo launched its new production center in Nanjing, Jiangsu province. With an investment of €70 million, the center will serve the plants of Brembo’s European customers, which produce cars and commercial vehicles in Asia. Covering an area of 95,000 sq m, it includes a foundry and production lines for brake discs and braking systems, as well as a research and development center. The plant will employ 850 people and has an annual production capacity of 6 million brake discs.
  • Chery Automobile Co will soon start assembling vehicles in northern Vietnam. The new plant would be its 17th overseas production site. Chery exported 17,412 vehicles in April, up 39% from a year earlier. Full-year exports might reach a new high of 200,000 units, the company said. Chery also plans to invest about half a billion dollars in Turkey over five years on a new engine factory and assembly plant. As pressure at home builds, many Chinese carmakers are reaching abroad for new growth opportunities.
  • The International Organization of Auto Vehicle Manufacturers said the top five Chinese auto brands measured by production are Changan Automobile, Beijing Automotive Group, Dongfeng Motor Corp, FAW Group Corp and Chery Automobile Co. The biggest one, Changan, plans to be able to produce 4 million automobiles annually under its independent brands by 2020. Changan now has six factories in Mexico, Egypt and other countries. Last year, its overseas operations generated CNY474.92 million in revenues, down 9.59% year-on-year.
  • South Korean automaker Kia Motor began recalling 1,624 Borrego models in China from June 6. The recalled vehicles were made between June 17, 2008 and July 28, 2009. According to the company, defects in the brake pedal were found in the U.S. market, but no incidents have been reported in China.
  • Chery announced that its May exports surpassed the 20,000-unit benchmark for the first time. The record high monthly export figure of 20,093 units is 42.4% more than the same period of last year, and 15.4% up from April. By the end of 2011, Chery had 16 production facilities, 1,153 dealerships and 1,188 service operations abroad.
  • Beijing Hyundai’s bestselling sedan, the 2008 Elantra, is the subject of safety recall due to airbag defects, involving 97,452 cars made between March 16, 2008, and January 25, 2010. The recall will start from July 10 to upgrade the faulty airbag control unit, which can trigger the airbag by mistake when the car is parked or running at slow speed. Unexpected airbag self-explosions have caused some injuries.
  • China has agreed to revive financial incentives for consumers to trade in their passenger cars to help increase demand. Relevant ministries are working out the details, such as the types of vehicles covered and amount of state funding. China in 2009 rolled out a cash-for-clunkers program to counter the global financial crisis, spurring CNY49.6 billion in new car purchases the following year.
  • China Yongda Automobiles Services Holdings aborted its initial public offering (IPO) in Hong Kong due to market volatility. The deal, in which the car dealer planned to raise USD433 million, is the biggest IPO to exit in Asia this year. Yongda is the second Chinese auto service firm to delay its IPO this year.
  • Dongfeng Motor, a joint venture with Nissan, announced it would invest CNY2 billion to expand the capacity of its plant in Xiangyang, Hubei, and add two Infiniti models to its production line.
  • China will allocate an annual fund of up to CNY2 billion from this year to help develop and mass produce new-energy vehicles to cut fuel consumption and carbon emissions, Vice Minister of Finance Zhang Shaochun said. Government departments, logistics operators and car rental firms in 25 pilot cities will be encouraged to use environmentally-friendly cars while buses with hybrid engines will run in major cities. Zhang also called on participating cities to lift traffic curbs on green cars and introduce preferential policies to help with parking, electricity fees and highway tolls to boost their use.
  • Two of BYD’s biggest dealers have stopped paying an advance subsidy of CNY120,000 to buyers of electric cars. They said buyers would have to pay the full price and then claim the subsidy themselves. The BYD e6 model costs CNY369,700. The decision was taken after it took some dealers nearly a year to get the subsidies back from the government, and some dealers had even stopped selling electric cars to avoid the delay in recovering their money. BYD sold 129 e6 models in April and 113 in March, which was short of the carmaker’s sales projection of about 300 units a month.
  • Volkswagen’s supervisory board approved the creation of a new position on its Board of Directors managing all business related to China, reflecting China’s importance as the world’s largest car market. The company sold 2.3 million cars in China last year, resulting in a €2.6 billion operating profit. Volkswagen’s new China Department will be run by Jochem Heizmann, who leaves his position as the head of the group’s truck business.
  • Chongqing will finance purchases of small-engine vehicles in its rural areas to counter the downturn in auto sales in China’s first local incentive program for the auto market. The city’s rural buyers of mini buses with engines of 1.6 liters or less and mini trucks and light trucks under 7.5 tons will receive a 6% subsidy on the sales price, with a maximum of CNY3,000 for each vehicle. The program will cover vehicles that are made by Chongqing-based automakers and bought in the city. Each qualified consumer can make only one subsidized purchase.
  • BMW is expecting a 25% to 30% increase in China sales this year to between 291,000 and 302,000 units, Friedrich Eichiner, CFO of BMW Group, said. China surpassed the U.S. in the first quarter of the year to become BMW’s biggest market. In the first four months, the brand sold 100,300 cars, 35% more than in the same period last year. In April the carmaker sold 27,191 vehicles in China, including its MINI and Rolls-Royce marques, a 31% year-on-year increase.
  • The new M4 SUV model from Great Wall Motors went on sale on May 25 with three variants priced between CNY63,900 and CNY71,000. The automaker plans to launch more than 20 new models in the next five years. It aims to sell 1.3 million vehicles and reach an annual production capacity of 1.5 million units in 2015.
  • China’s Ministry of Transport and Sweden’s Ministry of Enterprise, Energy and Communications signed a memorandum to set up a transportation safety research center that focuses on road safety and intelligent transportation systems. The center will be headquartered at the Ministry of Transport in Beijing, and branches will be set up at Shanghai’s Tongji University and Sweden’s Chalmers University of Technology. Volvo Car Corp, now owned by Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, will also be a part of the project.
  • General Motors and its joint ventures sold 231,183 vehicles in May, 21.3% more than in the same month a year earlier. Shanghai GM sold 99,113 units, up 7.1% from a year earlier, while SAIC-GM-Wuling delivered 127,749 units, an annual surge of 35.9%. But sales of FAW-GM dipped 0.7% year on year to 3,756 units. Sales of GM’s Buick brand fell 1.2% on an annual basis in May to 51,360 units, but sales of Buick Excelle jumped 19% to 23,085 units last month. Sales of GM’s Chevrolet in May hit the highest level when they rose 13.1% year on year to 48,563 units, with orders for the Chevrolet Cruze soaring 34% to 18,977 units. Cadillac posted a 2.2% fall in sales to 2,205 units in May.
  • On August 1, Mercedes-Benz will offer leasing options to private and commercial customers, making it easier to own a Mercedes-Benz. The company has won government approval to establish the Mercedes-Benz Leasing Co. Mercedes-Benz has begun to train financial consultants at its dealerships so they can provide expert advice and consultation. In China, though, only 10% of vehicle buyers used financing to obtain a vehicle in 2011, a proportion that has held steady for years. Analyst said financing is likely to become a much more popular means of buying automobiles in China in the coming years.
  • Leonardo Fioravanti, 74, the designer of the Ferrari Daytona and 288 GTO, was hired by Beijing Automotive as Chief Design Officer in April. The carmaker unveiled a prototype luxury sedan at the Beijing motor show and has said it wants to make “world-class” cars by 2025. Beijing Auto is among several Chinese carmakers betting that hiring a star designer will help burnish their brands and reverse a widening gap in market share behind General Motors and Volkswagen. None of the top 10 passenger vehicle models by sales this year belonged to homegrown brands.
 
 

Short news

May-18-2012 By : agxadmin

  • China’s number two carmaker, Dongfeng Motor, plans to boost export sales nearly fivefold to 300,000 vehicles a year by 2016, about 10% of its targeted total production. Dongfeng has set up a new international marketing department and will diversify its range to meet the target. Dongfeng’s total production last year was 2.17 million vehicles and it exported 63,800 units.
  • Volkswagen will invest about €170 million building a new plant in Urumqi, capable of making 50,000 vehicles a year from 2015. Its two Chinese joint ventures are investing a total of €14 billion by 2016, and the German-based group has said in the past its annual production capacity in China would rise to 3 million cars as early as next year.
  • BYD posted a 90% slide in quarterly profit as a slowdown in the world’s largest car market and losses in its solar business hit the company. Shenzhen-based BYD reported a CNY27 million net profit for the first three months of 2012, down from CNY266.74 million in the previous year. BYD’s car sales fell 4% in the first quarter to 114,000 vehicles, but March sales were up 8% on the year, which outperformed the industry.
  • Volvo’s Chinese owner, Geely, offered to take a large minority stake in the Japanese maker of Subaru cars – an offer that was not accepted. Two sources said Zhejiang Geely Holding Group offered to buy a stake of about 20% in Japan’s Fuji Heavy Industries late last year through an investment banking intermediary. It could have paved the way for a joint venture in China to produce Subarus, which are now imported.
  • Shanghai General Motors will recall some of its 2012 Chevrolet Aveo vehicles because of faulty brake fluid sensors, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (GAQSIC) said. Shanghai GM will recall 47,415 of the cars due to a defect in the sensors. The defect could fail to alert drivers of low brake fluid levels. Shanghai GM is attempting to contact Aveo owners and will make repairs at no charge, it said.
  • Nanjing’s city government has launched an investigation into the Ferrari dealership that staged a car-driving display on the ancient city wall. Ferrari’s China representative has apologized to Nanjing residents for the incident and a government official who allowed the display to take place has been sacked.
  • Two mainland car firms may launch initial public offerings in Hong Kong as early as next month to raise a combined HKD6.24 billion, according to market sources. Shanghai-based Yongda Auto, a dealer for brands including BMW, Audi, Porsche and Toyota, plans to raise between HKD3.1 billion and HKD3.9 billion on the Hong Kong stock market, while Xinchen Group, a subsidiary of Hong Kong-listed Brilliance Auto, seeks to raise between HKD1.56 billion and HKD2.34 billion.
  • China produced only 6,000 electric vehicles, and no more than 10 models, in 2011, only 0.03% of the year’s total output, well short of the 500,000 industry capacity it had slated to come on stream by 2015. The 16,000 charging piles built in 2011 were also far lower than the industry’s target of 400,000 units by 2015.
  • China Auto Rental, the country’s largest car-rental provider, postponed its U.S. share offering due to weak demand. It had expected to raise up to USD137.5 million. Venture capitalists and private-equity fund managers said more Chinese companies were taking a wait-and-see attitude towards U.S. IPOs amid a tighter scrutiny of accounting records and lower buying interest. China Auto would not be able to meet the requirement of three consecutive years of profits imposed by the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) to launch an IPO in China. China Auto, founded in 2007, lost CNY151 million last year.
  • Shi Jianhua, Deputy Secretary General of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM), said the central government may announce plans this year to boost the incentives for the purchase of green vehicles in light of plans to raise production of the vehicles from less than 2,000 units last year to 500,000 in 2015 and 5 million by 2020. The carmakers must cover the incentive at the time the car is sold and then claim it from the government, but some said they encountered problems to get the refund.
  • Premium audio and infotainment group Harman International Industries’ business in China has grown from zero five years ago to USD260 million last year, and “we target to have USD350 million revenue for this year,” said Dinesh Paliwal, Chairman, President and CEO of the U.S. company. “We expect our annual sales in China to surge to USD1 billion by 2015, when China will be our largest market in the world,” said Paliwal. “As a company with 75% revenue from the automobile sector, the industry will definitely boost our business, especially with increasing demand for high-end vehicles,” added Paliwal.
  • Car plate prices in Shanghai set a record in the April auction, exceeding the CNY60,000 benchmark for the first time. By comparison, a new VW Polo only costs CNY77,900. The average price for a license plate rose to CNY61,626, up CNY3,001 from a month earlier. The lowest price increased CNY2,700 to CNY61,000. The city government increased the quota to 8,500 this month, 500 more than last month. The number of bidders was 22,706, down from 24,897 in March. Shanghai will auction 9,300 car license plates on May 19.
  • Nissan’s luxury car unit Infiniti will become the first Japanese luxury brand to start production in China in 2014 in Nissan’s flagship venture with Dongfeng Motor Co. Two Infiniti models will be produced domestically as part of a strategy to increase the global sales of Infiniti to 500,000 units by 2016. China has been the second largest
    market for Infiniti for two years after Nissan started importing the models to the country in 2007. Last year, sales of Infiniti cars rose 60% on an annual basis to 19,075 units in China.
  • China imported 284,000 vehicles in the first three months of the year, 21.7% more than in the same period last year. Imports maintained an average year-on-year growth rate of more than 30% over the past decade. In 2011, the total sales of imported automobiles reached 1.04 million. Of those, 1.01 million were passenger vehicles,  In 2011, the imported SUV segment surged 35% to 539,000 units, taking a 53.3% share of the import market, passenger cars accounted for 40% and multi-purpose vehicles took 5%. Jeep and Land Rover led SUV imports in the first quarter, with year-on-year growth rates of 567.6% and 127.7%, respectively.
  • The three entry-level vehicle segments ― minicar, subcompact and compact ― account for 55% to 60% of China’s passenger vehicle sales, according to LMC Automotive China. Sales of entry-level vehicles in the first three months of 2012 declined by 5% from the same period last year. Minicars led the decline with a 30% drop in sales compared to the same quarter in 2011.
  • China’s First Automobile Works Group Corp is going to revive its legendary brand Hongqi, or Red Flag ― which in 1958 was China’s first domestically produced car ― by launching its luxury model H7 in October, said FAW Chairman Xu Jianyi. The new model will be Hongqi’s first hybrid sedan with core technologies developed by the company itself. The car will compete with Audi and Mercedes-Benz. Four other vehicle types will be developed for the Hongqi brand, including two sport utility vehicles, a multi-purpose vehicle for business use and a mid-size limousine coach for ceremonies and parades. The company said that it has already invested CNY5.2 billion in research and development (R&D) of the Hongqi brand.
  • Dongfeng Motor Corp said a new model with the working name Dongfeng-1 is under development, with the first concept model expected to make a world premier at the 2013 Shanghai auto show. Three variants with engine displacements ranging from 1.8-liter to 2.4-liter are planned on the PSA platform. Dongfeng sold more than 3 million vehicles in 2011. Its own-brand vehicles contributed 1.12 million units, one-third of its full lineup.
  • Fuji Heavy Industries said it no longer expects to start building cars in China as part of a five-year growth plan that runs until March 2016, and lowered its global sales target for the final year by 50,000 vehicles. It said it would continue to import cars into China after an unsuccessful bid to obtain Chinese government approval for a joint venture with Chery Automobile Co to build Subaru cars. The company now projects Chinese sales at 100,000 vehicles for the year 2015/2016, from an earlier 180,000 target.
  • The Shanghai Commission of Consumers’ Rights and Interests Protection warned locals to watch out for car cushions made of substandard textiles that include discarded fabric and medical waste fibers to avoid health hazards. People will suffer from coughing, asthma, and serious respiratory diseases after inhaling the dust and bacteria produced by toxic cushions, the Commission warned.
  • For every 100 families in downtown Shanghai at the end of last year, 18 owned private sedans, 13 more than five years ago, according to a new survey.
 
 

Short news automotive

Apr-19-2012 By : agxadmin

  • A firm from Nanjing, Jiangsu province, will invest CNY12 billion in China’s largest electric vehicle production line at Deyang. Nanjing Jiayuan Electric Vehicle said that more than 350,000 electric cars would roll out yearly once construction would be completed, but did not give a date.
  • BYD Co reported net profit in 2011 fell 45% to CNY1.38 billion on weaker demand for vehicles. The Shenzhen-based company sold 437,000 vehicles last year, down 13.3%. BYD’s revenues decreased 1% from a year earlier in 2011 to CNY46.31 billion, but its gross profit dived by 17% to CNY6.87 billion. The Shenzhen-based company blamed the profit decrease on its waning battery business. BYD’s automobile sales decreased by 13.33% in 2011 from the previous year to 437,000 vehicles. BYD has only sold about 1,000 electric vehicles since it introduced them more than two years ago.
  • Geely posted a 13% gain in profit last year to CNY1.54 billion from CNY1.37 billion earlier. The company’s  vehicle sales increased 1% to 421,611 units in 2011. It has set a goal of 9% growth in sales to 460,000 units this year.
  • The first model from Dongfeng Nissan’s wholly owned brand Venucia rolled off the production line in March at the joint venture’s second factory in Zhengzhou. The D50 model will be available in four configurations priced between CNY70,000 and CNY90,000.
  • Bosch Automotive Diesel Systems Co, the joint venture between Germany’s Robert Bosch and Wuxi Weifu High-Technology Group Co, recently announced that it will invest CNY1.6 billion in a new facility in Qingdao to produce diesel fuel injectors and other products. The 110,000 square meter site will be Bosch’s second manufacturing site for clean diesel technology in China.
  • Beijing Communist Party Secretary Liu Qi and Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga unveiled the name plaque of Foton Motor Kenya at a founding ceremony in Nairobi. Chinese automaker Foton Motor also opened a USD50 million assembly plant in Nairobi to explore the market in Kenya and east Africa.
  • BMW will recall more than 120,200 models of its 5-Series and 6-Series sedans to fix a battery problem. The recall, from May 10, will affect 118,256 units of the BMW 5-Series sedans produced by its Chinese joint venture, BMW Brilliance Automotive, between March 2003 and September 2010, and 381 imported units of the same model that were made during the period. The German carmaker will also recall 1,046 units of its imported 6-Series coupés produced between September 2003 and July 2010 as well as 563 units of the 6-Series cabriolet models made from December 2003 to July 2010. The faulty batteries may stall the engine and cause fire under extreme cases.
  • The Beijing Municipal Transport Commission is encouraging communities within the fourth ring road to build more than 110,000 new parking spaces by the end of next year by offering a CNY2,000 reward for each space. The capital has more than 5 million vehicles on its roads but only 2.48 million parking spaces.
  • Mazda and its joint venture partners in China were recalling more than 62,000 vehicles to fix problems with anti-lock braking systems that could cause false warnings. The three-party joint venture with Ford and Chongqing Changan Automobile will recall 58,949 Mondeo sedans and 3,496 S-Max vehicles and replace problem parts, the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (GAQSIQ) said.
  • Ford’s China unit will invest about USD600 million to increase capacity of its Chongqing passenger-car factory by almost 60% to 950,000 vehicles a year by 2014. The company, with joint venture partner Changan Automobile, would increase capacity by 350,000 units.
  • Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, parent of Geely Automobile, plans to spend USD11 billion on Volvo Cars over the next five years. Geely, which took over Swedish brand Volvo from Ford in 2010, aims to build an engine plant, beef up research and development (R&D), and upgrade technology at Volvo, Geely President Li Shufu said. “We want to revive Volvo and give the brand its strength back,” he added.
  • General Motors’s Chinese partner reported full-year profit rose 23% on demand for the top-selling Buick Excelle and Chevrolet Cruze sedans. SAIC Motor Corp’s net income rose to CNY20.2 billion last year, while sales rose 18.9% to CNY434.8 billion. GM’s sales in China rose an annual 11% to a record for March. Deliveries of cars and Wuling minivans increased to 257,944 units. Unit sales gained 8.7% to a record 745,152 units in the first quarter.
  • A long-awaited draft regulation on school bus safety management was passed at an executive meeting of the Chinese government chaired by Premier Wen Jiabao. Higher technical standards are set for school buses and stricter requirements for drivers. The regulation was prompted by a string of road accidents involving school students and pre-schoolers in November and December.
  • Volkswagen announced a personnel reshuffle in its China operation, including seven new appointments to strengthen sales and marketing. Lubos Vlcek has been named as Executive Director of Volkswagen Group China in sales, second-hand car and after sale business since April 5. Other new appointments cover marketing, imported vehicle business, premium car affiliate Bentley, the Seat brand in China, as well as the sales division of its Chinese joint venture FAW-VW Automobile Co.
  • Bentley Motors announced that China has become its biggest market globally due to significant sales growth in the first quarter of 2012. Bentley sold 578 of its ultra-luxury cars in China in the three months, an 84.9% increase over the same period last year, to surpass the United States, where 468 units were sold. Globally it sold 1,759 cars in the period, a 46.6% increase over the same period last year.
  • Jaguar Land Rover sold 17,997 vehicles in China in the first three months of 2012, a year-on-year growth of 110%. China has become the fastest-growing market for the automaker, and is likely to soon be its biggest.
  • Mazda Motor Co set a record in the first quarter by selling 57,631 units, 16% more than in the same period in 2011. Its two joint ventures ― FAW Mazda and Chang’an Mazda ― sold 35,105 units and 22,526 units respectively in the period, a year-on-year growth of 5% and 37% respectively. The company plans to increase the number of its dealers in China from 371 in March to 420 by year’s end.
  • Toyota Motors announced that it sold 86,000 cars in China in March, up 2.2% from the same month last year. It sold 211,500 cars in the first quarter, a year-on-year increase of 1.9%. Toyota plans to sell 1 million cars in China this year, an expected increase of 13% over last year’s sales.
  • Italian tire maker Pirelli expects sales in the Asia-Pacific region to increase 23% annually to €650 million by 2014, from €353 million last year, as it increases capacity in China and Indonesia to meet demand. Pirelli supplies tires to BMW, Audi and Mercedes-Benz in China.
  • Honda Motor Co plans to double sales in China to about 1.2 million vehicles by 2015. The company will introduce more than 10 new and revamped models to China from 2013 to 2015 to support sales growth. Honda will also develop cars especially for the Chinese market and increase purchases of components from local suppliers to lower cost. Honda has a joint venture with Guangzhou Automobile Group with an annual output of 480,000 units and another with Dongfeng Motor Corp that is able to produce 240,000 vehicles a year.
  • Domestic carmaker Chery sold more than 58,700 vehicles last month, up 35.8%  from February, and shipped some 12,400 cars overseas, up 18% from the previous month and an increase of 5.2% from a year ago. Sales of the Tiggo SUV in March totaled 12,895 units, a record high.
  • BYD announced it will expand the warranty on all its products to four years or 100,000 km, twice its previous two-year, 60,000 km warranty. For its all-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles and their core components, the company offers a five-year or 100,000 km warranty. The move is expected to boost consumer confidence.
  • Shanghai Volkswagen reported a growth of 19.7% in March sales to 107,840 units. Strong sales for the month brought its quarterly wholesale shipments up 11.5% year-on-year to nearly 320,000 vehicles, including 262,968 Volkswagens and 56,920 Skodas. The company now has more than 600 dealerships in China for its Volkswagen-brand vehicles.
 
 

Short news automotive

Mar-22-2012 By : agxadmin

  • The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (GAQSIQ) said GM (China) Investment Corp and Shanghai GM started to recall some imported cars, including 1,586 Opel Antara and 16,618 Chevrolet Captiva cars. The models were made between April 11, 2006, and November 9, 2009. The two companies reported flaws in the anti-lock braking system, resulting from impure brake fluid. The flaw might cause safety risks as drivers needed a longer braking distance.
  • U.S. school bus maker Blue Bird Corp said it wants to work jointly with Chinese partners, but it denied a Reuters report saying that China’s Zongshen Industrial Group Co is discussing with the company a USD250 million acquisition deal. The company is reportedly also discussing with Xiamen Winterthur International New Energy Automobile Co about local production of school buses in Xiamen. The sales of school buses may hit 70,000 units this year, Sinolink Securities Co said, adding the demand may grow explosively.
  • Shanghai-based SAIC Motor, China’s largest carmaker, plans to sell 4.33 million vehicles this year, up 8% from last year, President Chen Hong said. In the year’s first two months, sales grew 6.9% year on year to 747,000 units.
  • Chinese car parts maker Hebei Lingyun is buying German peer Kiekert for an undisclosed sum. The merger would create a company with a turnover of €1 billion, Kiekert said. Lingyun would take over 55% of Kiekert from a foreign consortium including Blue-Bay Asset Management, Silver Point Capital and Morgan Stanley. Henan North Xingguang Machinery and Electric Co will have a 25% stake, and an investment foundation from Tianjin will have the rest. In 2011, Kiekert sold more than 41 million latch systems.
  • BMW’s China sales rose about 30% over the same period last year after it reported record deliveries of more than 232,000 vehicles in China in 2011, according to Ivan Koh, President of BMW China Automotive Trading. A major force expected to drive production and sales this year is its newly completed plant ― BMW’s second in Shenyang ― that will increase annual output in China to 200,000 vehicles or more. An expanded product lineup is another positive factor.
  • About 30 million vehicles are expected to be sold in China annually by 2020, making it overwhelmingly the largest car market in the world, new forecasts reveal. The country’s current auto sales of 17 million a year, already the highest of any country, will leap 73% in the next eight years as first-time drivers take to the roads, according to data from IHS Global Insight, a European research firm. In third- and fourth-tier cities car use is still extremely low. Gansu and Hunan provinces, for example, have fewer than 40 cars per 1,000 people, compared with more than 400 cars per 1,000 in the U.S.
  • Volkswagen said it is not considering a recall of vehicles to fix a defective direct-shift gearbox despite the  General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine (GAQSIQ) urging it to launch a thorough investigation into potential risks. The problem involves about 500,000 vehicles sold in China.
  • Illegal car factories remained widespread in Hubei province’s Shiyan city – a major source of car parts – CCTV reported. In the city’s Bailang Economic and Technical Development Zone alone, about 30 factories provide vehicles that are pieced together with car parts made on site. The illegally-made vehicles were found to have many problems. Fake certificates of authenticity could be purchased from legal vehicle manufacturers.
  • The price of a license plate in Shanghai reached an all-time high of CNY58,625 in March with the average cost rising CNY2,993 from a month earlier. The lowest price for a plate hit CNY58,300, also a record, up CNY2,900 from a month earlier. The municipal government put 8,000 car plates up at this month’s auction, the same as last month. The number of bidders rose to 24,897, compared to 23,391 in February.
  • Full-year vehicle sales may increase less than 5%, said Gu Huaxiang, Deputy Secretary General of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM). The weaker outlook was lower than CAAM’s estimate at the start of this year of an 8% rise to 20 million units. Sales of commercial vehicles will be hit the hardest, he added. In the first two months of this year, vehicle deliveries fell 6% year on year to 2.95 million units.
  • The State Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC) ordered an investigation into allegations of fraudulent sales of Chrysler jeeps. CCTV has alleged some of the  jeeps contained components which did not originate from the factories where the vehicles were manufactured, leading to suspicion of fraud. Chrysler ordered distributors to apologize to customers if problems were found and to replace their faulty jeeps.
  • Mercedes-Benz said China sales grew 61% year on year to 20,250 units in February, including Mercedes-Benz, smart, AMG and Maybach vehicles. Total sales in the first two months reached 35,640 units. Sales of S-Class vehicles reached a monthly record in February with 7,030 units, up 213% year on year. The locally-produced E-Class and C-Class sedans posted combined sales of 7,390 units in February.
  • Bosch Group has agreed to invest CNY1.6 billion to build the second manufacturing plant for its diesel system in China. The new facility will be located in the Qingdao National Hi-Tech Industrial Development Zone and mainly produce advanced fuel injectors. Bosch said demand for energy-saving diesel technologies is expected to grow rapidly in China as the national IV diesel emission standard would take effect in 2013.
  • Renault will appoint its Executive Vice President Katsumi Nakamura to take full charge of its China business starting from April. He joined Nissan in April 1978 and was appointed President of Dongfeng Motor Co in 2003. Company officials said the move highlights the importance of the Chinese market while industry observers noted it may also help speed up the localized production of Renault cars in China.
 
 
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