Honda Motor Co’s President and CEO, Takeo Fukui, has announced a raft of new factories and a boost in production to meet Honda’s booming global demand.

Mr Fukui made the announcements in his customary mid-year speech, saying Honda had carried out plans to strengthen the foundation of growth and advancement on a global scale and the development of advanced technologies and products.
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From 2010 Ford Australia will import a global new Duratec V6 engine, including high performance derivatives, for use in the company’s locally made Falcon, Falcon Ute and Territory model lines. The improved economies of scale resulting from the globally-sourced engine will offer increased flexibility to potentially incorporate future alternative fuel strategies, particularly diesel technology.

As a result, the company will discontinue its Australian I6 engine operations in Geelong in 2010. Redeployment opportunities will be maximised wherever possible and the company will work closely with its employees and unions to minimise the impact on the 600 people affected by the decision across engine operations. The company’s remaining 1400 employees in Geelong and 3000 in Campbellfield will not be directly impacted by the decision.
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Mazda Motor Corporation today celebrated reaching 40 million units of cumulative production in Japan with a commemorative ceremony at its Ujina Plant No.2 near Mazda’s headquarters in Hiroshima. Mazda’s Representative Director, Chairman of the Board, President and CEO, Hisakazu Imaki, together with executive officers and union representatives, looked on as an all-new Mazda2 rolled off the production line to mark the 40 millionth unit production milestone. This record was achieved in the 75 years and nine months since Mazda began production of three-wheeled trucks in October 1931.
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Honda today announced that worldwide cumulative sales of the Honda Jazz have reached two million units at the end of the June 2007.

Since its release in June 2001 in Japan, the Jazz (known as the Fit in Japan, North American, South America and China) has won fans and awards everywhere for its efficient packaging, superior fuel efficiency, advanced styling, and in 2002 became Japan’s best-selling car. Now into its seventh year, the current generation Jazz remains one of the top selling vehicles in Japan.
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Volkswagen has completed its squad for the 2008 Dakar Rally: Three-time German Rally Champion Dieter Depping (Germany) and co-driver Timo Gottschalk (Germany) drive the fourth Volkswagen factory entered Race Touareg in the desert classic at the start of January. The two Germans line-up alongside team mates Carlos Sainz/Michel Périn (E/F), Giniel de Villiers/Dirk von Zitzewitz (RSA/D) and Mark Miller/Ralph Pitchford (USA/RSA). Also, Carlos Sousa (P) and co-driver Andy Schulz (D) compete in a Race Touareg prepared by the Lagos customer team.
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Audi has scored top marks in the annual NRMA Insurance Vehicle Security Ratings, released late last week. Both the Audi A3 Sportback 3.2 quattro, Audi Q7 and A8 scored the highest overall in their respective fields of Small/Medium Cars, 4WDs and Luxury Vehicles.

NRMA Insurance’s annual Vehicle Security Ratings measure the ability of a car to resist being broken into, stolen and re-birthed.

Cited as the ‘stand out’ manufacturer in this year’s rating, every Audi model featured in the top 10 most secure vehicles.
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Hyundai announced today that its crucial new five-door hatchback will be known as the Hyundai i30 when it makes its Australian debut in October.

While the i30 shares the same platform as the newly-introduced Elantra sedan, it is an entirely separate development, designed to spearhead Hyundai’s attack on the competitive small hatch market. As a result, i30 has been closely benchmarked against its competitors, and the i30 name has been chosen to reflect the car’s European styling and its all-round intelligent design.
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The Volkswagen Group delivered 3.09 million vehicles to customers throughout the world in the first six months of 2007, an all-time sales record for the company for the first half of a year. This corresponds to an increase of 7.8 percent over the same period last year.

Group deliveries from January through June 2007 in Europe rose by 3.7 percent to 1.86 million vehicles, 1.62 million of which went to Western Europe (1.3 percent increase). This more than makes up for the 3.7 percent decline in Germany, the largest single market, where 515,000 vehicles were delivered. The 238,000 vehicles sold in Central and Eastern Europe produced an increase of 22.8 percent.
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Mary Taylor, the Mornington Peninsula grandmother who hasn’t let her 89 years dampen her spirit of adventure, has set off on yet another long-distance road trip around Australia — except this time she is going green thanks to a petrol-electric Honda Civic Hybrid.

Mary’s 46-day odyssey will see her cover 16,000 kilometres as she travels clockwise around the continent, from Mornington to Echuca, the Red Centre, Perth, Darwin and then back home via Longreach, Broken Hill and Mildura.
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Hybrid cars — such as Honda’s Civic Hybrid — are appearing on more new car buyer shopping lists, according to a report released by Roy Morgan Research.

The Roy Morgan Single Source survey shows that with fuel prices rising, more than half of Australian new car buyers are seriously considering purchasing a petrol-electric Hybrid vehicle within four years.

The survey found that 74 per cent of all new car buyers regard fuel efficiency as more important than high performance – and that women are a key driver for Hybrid purchases in higher income households.
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Britain’s Which? Car magazine has named the Honda Jazz as the most reliable new car after surveying 100,000 new car owners.

The magazine’s owner satisfaction survey gave the Jazz a reliability rating of 96 per cent, with owners confirming the car rarely lets them down, cementing the hatchback’s reputation as the number one reliable car.

Not surprisingly, the Jazz also topped its “super mini” segment.
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With the Mercedes-Benz A-Class F-Cell, the first fuel-cell-powered passenger car is now on the road in Iceland.

DaimlerChrysler has delivered the zero-emissions vehicle to the companies Landsvirkjun and Reykjavik Energy. The two energy utilities will use the vehicle for an initial period of one year in their fleets under realistic conditions.
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Mercedes-Benz has launched its own Internet television broadcasting service with a live report from Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Berlin.

“Mercedes-Benz TV” will broadcast in German and English and set new standards for online brand communication. The Internet TV service will feature a weekly news magazine hosted by Tanja Bülter, a society reporter from the RTL television network.
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“Wanna bet that a Touareg V10 TDI can tow a Boeing 747?” “A 155-ton jet?” “Never!” “Sure it can!” This verbal exchange by two Volkswagen employees had consequences: A few months later, on Thursday this week, a Volkswagen crew did indeed hook up a new generation Touareg V10 TDI to a 747. The certified result: The SUV pulled it off easily. However, the receipt of orders from airport operators wanting to replace their tow vehicles weighing up to 70 tons with the significantly more economical Touareg could not be confirmed.
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TOUAREG PROVES ITS QUALITIES IN EXPEDITIONS AROUND THE WORLD

Globetrotter. On countless expeditions the automotive globetrotter has circled the world, setting numerous records along the way. In Chile for example the Touareg climbed to the highest volcano on earth at 6,080 meters altitude, the highest peak ever climbed by any production car. And as a service vehicle in the legendary “Dakar” rally race, the production model Touareg sweeps thousands of kilometers across the Sahara, year after year, to support the “Touareg Race”. No other SUV has won the hearts of such a large community of car fans in such a comparably short period of time as the Touareg. Now this is being followed up by an advanced, newly developed generation.
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