TPT March 2014

Global Marketplace

At the Detroit show of 2013, Mark Fields, likely Ford’s next CEO, pledged that the company would take as much as 750 pounds out of its next-generation trucks to meet tightening fuel-economy regulations. Now Ford is eager to demonstrate the toughness of aluminium to pickup buyers who have made the F-150 the favourite it is. › Plug-in electric vehicles may be cutting-edge technology, but an analysis performed at the request of USA Today suggests that most will depreciate in value more dramatically over five years than their conventional counterparts. According to the findings by Kelley Blue Book, which calculates resale prices by brand and model, some of the biggest gaps involve 2014 models powered solely by batteries, without gas engines. One example – the Ford Focus Electric compact – will be worth 20 per cent of its initial $35,995 list price, while a well- outfitted conventional Focus Titanium will still command 36 per cent on resale. The little electric Chevrolet Spark EV is projected to be worth 28 per cent of its $28,305 list price in five years, while a comparable conventional version of the same car will retain 40 per cent of its value. As a mitigating factor for the buyer of a new plug-in electric, many such cars qualify for a US federal tax credit of up to $7,500, in addition to any state or local incentives.

Automotive, in the Chinese market the Volkswagen marque now outsells GM’s main Buick, Chevrolet and Cadillac brands combined. Both companies surpassed their targets to deliver more than 3 million vehicles in China last year, with Volkswagen reaching the goal on 5 December and GM a week later. The German automaker had held a lead over its US rival of about 70,000 vehicles through the year, according to data from the two producers. Competition is set to intensify among top European and American automakers, which have announced a combined $36 billion in investment for China this year even as more Chinese cities are considering vehicle restrictions to cut pollution. “China is the big battleground,” Klaus Paur, head of automotive research at the Paris-based global market research company Ipsos, told Bloomberg . › In news of Ford, the automaker was expected to present a high-stakes redesign at the Detroit auto show in January: an all-aluminium version of its F-150 truck, the top-selling pickup of all time. Metal Miner on 27 December carried a report that Alcoa Inc (Pittsburgh), which makes aluminium blast shields for battlefield vehicles, had been asked to lend some of its military-grade metal to the Ford display.

Dorothy Fabian Features Editor (USA)

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M arch 2014