Auto News 5

Audi has reached an agreement with Ducati's owner to buy the motorcycle maker for about 860 million euros ($1.1 billion), a person familiar with the matter said. VW's supervisory board is set to approve the deal on Wednesday, the source added.

Unions concerned about the possible closure of PSA Peugeot Citroen's Aulnay plant have raised the possibility the automaker could wield the axe imminently - a proposition from which the manufacturer is keen to distance itself.

Figures released by ACEA show that the EU car market was down for the sixth consecutive month in March, with a decline of 7% compared to March last year.

The new Mercedes CLS Shooting Brake is spotted testing with virtually no disguise

Spy pictures of new RS6 Avant emerge, which packs a twin-turbocharged 4.0-litre V8 with more than 500bhp

Spy pictures of new RS6 Avant emerge, which packs a twin-turbocharged 4.0-litre V8 with 550bhp

One little game than can be played with new van announcements, given the number of joint ventures here in Europe, is where is it from? Any guesses on the provenance of the new third string to the Mercedes-Benz van bow - the Citan?

In this month's management briefing, Rob Golding runs his financial rule over the financial position of the automotive industry's major OEMs. In this instalment: Volkswagen, BMW and Daimler.

European new-car sales dropped to a fourteen-year low last month, led by Fiat, PSA and Renault, as economic growth stalled in the region amid ongoing economic problems and subdued consumer confidence.

Opel plans to move some production of its Astra compact car to Poland from one of its German plants, a newspaper report said.

More product-sharing ventures are cooking between Daimler and Nissan, beyond the entry-level Infiniti based on Mercedes-Benz front-wheel-drive architecture that Nissan is preparing to create.

Daimler has released details of its Mercedes-Benz Citan delivery van, ahead of its unveiling at the IAA commercial vehicle show in Hanover, Germany, in September. The van is the first vehicle to result from two years of cooperation with Renault.

Ferdinand Piech's recent retreat from the limelight might be seen as a sign the Volkswagen chairman might step back from leading the carmaker that aspires to be the world's biggest.

Ferdinand Piech's recent retreat from the limelight might be seen as a sign the Volkswagen chairman might step back from leading the carmaker that aspires to be the world's biggest.

The MINI Inspired by Goodwood special edition is on display in a front window at London's famous Harrods department store. Taking inspiration from the design team at Rolls Royce, the car is touted as MINI's “most ambitious and luxurious” special edition to date.

Photo: BMW

Brompton Road passers-by will see a quintessentially English manor house and gates as a backdrop to the MINI. Inside the store, display screens provide information and a selection of swatches and samples are available to show off interior trims. A MINI staffer from the brand's Park Lane flagship showroom is on hand in case shoppers get the itch to order.

The Goodwood features a dashboard, centre console, air vents, carpets, heated leather seats, roof lining, doors and interior cladding finished in Rolls-Royce's exclusive colour Cornsilk. The dashboard and door handle surfaces are Walnut Burr, a premium, custom Rolls trim.

The exterior is finished in Rolls Royce's Diamond Black metallic.

The phrase “1 of 1000” will be projected onto the pavement outside the store window, and the whole works on display until Sunday.

Ford will debut an all-new pony car its staffers are calling Mustang III in mid-2014, just in time for the nameplate's 50th anniversary. If artist Sean Smith has it right, the new generation will eschew retro styling for a look based largely on the Evos concept, minus the gullwing doors.

Ford Evos Concept (Photo: Ford)

With the model planned to go global, marketers are looking to broaden the car's nostalgic appeal with a slicker look, leaner weight, and underpinnings from an all-new platform.

Rumour has it this ‘Stang will at last make the switch to fully independent rear suspension, the better to compete with Chevy's hit Camaro.

Power will likely come from a variation of the brand's EcoBoost engines, with a V8 iteration a possibility.

The Mustang III will likely debut this time next year in New York.


_{Source: The Detroit Bureau}

With sales plunging 41% in the region since 2007, Toyota is taking a three-pronged approach to get back into the European game: a leaner executive suite, new models, and a new partner in BMW.

“It's unacceptable for Toyota to be at this volume level in Europe,” said Didier Leroy, Toyota's European chief, in an interview with Bloomberg.com. Leroy said they had cut management layers to streamline decision-making over the past two years.

Photo: Toyota

Toyota will roll out a Yaris hybrid, Europe's first hybrid subcompact, and the GT86 sports coupe. Yaris production started in northern France earlier this week, following an investment of $33 million in the company's Valenciennes factory.

The GT86, geared to compete with VW's Scirocco and Peugeot Citroen's RCZ, gets up to 100 km/h in a hair over eight seconds. Toyota is targeting just 15,000 units of the sporty coupe; their overall goal for Europe, Russia, Turkey and Israel is a cool million next year, 20% higher than their 2012 target.

BMW starts delivering diesel engines to Toyota in 2014; diesels are less taxed than gasoline engines in many European countries.



_{Source: Bloomberg}

As they grapple with high rates of kidnapping, murder and robbery, Brazilians are starting to turn to an option formerly reserved for diplomats and rap stars — armoured cars.

DuPont in 2008 introduced its bulletproof Kevlar fibre and SentryGlas car kit, Armura, to middle-class Brazilians for installation on their Chevys, Hondas and Kias.

Now, the chemical company wants to bulletproof taxis that will shuttle visitors between events at the 2014 World Cup soccer championship and 2016 Olympic Games in Rio.

The Brazil-only Armura protects against bullets up to .38 calibre; sales in Brazil were up 70% in the first quarter this year over last year. DuPont says its annual sales of Armura amount to “tens of millions” of dollars, but didn't offer more specifics.

Armura sells for about $12,000 and weighs about 90 kg. DuPont-approved technicians replace the car's windows with SentryGlas and put Kevlar panels behind the door panels. It's currently available on 11 models including the Toyota Corolla and Chevy Cruze.

The largest private guards' union in Brazil estimates that residents spend about $8 billion on private security each year.


_{Source: Reuters}

2012 marks the 30th year since Formula One Ferrari legend Gilles Villeneuve's fatal crash during qualifying of the 1982 Belgian Grand Prix. Here is the latest piece of our special feature on this special hero, from the mouth of Richard Spénard.

After a successful 1973 season spent in F1600, the young Gilles Villeneuve decided it was time to pack his things and move on to the next level: Formula Atlantic.

Richard Spenard (left) in conversation with Gilles Villeneuve. (Photo: Richard Spenard's Archives)

At the time, Europeans knew very little about the North American series. Still, the single seaters, propelled by a 1.6-litre atmospheric engine, were doing well to attract the young and bright talents of Europe, maybe because of the wings and slick tires they featured. Keke Rosberg, Patrick Depailler, Jacques Laffite, James Hunt, Riccardo Patrese and Didier Pironi all had a go at it.

1974 - Villeneuve's first season in Atlantic - saw the Canadian break a leg at Mosport. He came back in 1975 and earned his first triumph, through the rain of Gimli, in Manitoba. Soon after that, driving the March 76B that now sits at the Berthierville Gilles-Villeneuve museum and then Écurie Canada's 77B, Villeneuve won the 1976 and 1977 championships.

Partnering him through these successful times was fellow up-and-coming Quebec native Richard Spénard - a future F2000, Porsche Cup and GM series champion and 24 Hours of Le Mans racer. Today, the 58-year-old is still active as a Ferrari Challenge coach and remembers very well his first meeting with Gilles Villeneuve.

"I met him for the first time in the spring of 1975, in a restaurant. I was coming up from Formula Ford, he already had a season of Atlantic under his belt. What stood out of that meeting was how, three weeks before the start of the season, Villeneuve had no deal at all. He was looking for a drive," Spénard remembers.

Gilles Villeneuve, Écurie Canada ( (Photo: René Fagnan's Archives)

"And for him to get a seat, he would have to do all the work associated with it. I mean all the work, from preparing to driving the car," he told Auto123.com.

"So I partnered him at Écurie Canada through 1977. There I saw how big the gap was between him and the rest of us."

"By that, I mean he was already top-notch, professional in his approach because of all his snowmobile years. Building, developing and testing new parts was nothing new for him. Those technical abilities he had were what set him apart from us, who knew little about running a race car.

"We sat in and drove. He worked non-stop with the engineers to improve whatever could be improved. Hands on he was, indeed. [...] He also did all those exercises away from the track to improve his field of vision and that sort of things. Being in the same team as him also meant that if he crashed his car, he was allowed to take mine."

Other memories of Spénard being Villeneuve's teammate include watching future F1 world champion Jacques grow, sitting duck in a Ford Mustang and off-roading in Berthierville.

"Gilles' family was very much with him at the track. I remember watching Jacques, growing up from breathing and living in the paddocks."

Gilles Villeneuve sitting in Richard Spenard's car (Spenard is seen on the left, sitting on the concrete wall). (Photo: Guy Bellerive)

"On the road, I was a very disciplined driver because, ironically, I wasn't much of a car guy, not a nutcase anyway - unlike Gilles who always had either a wrench or a wheel in his hands. If he was not souping up his cars, he was driving them. In his Mustang V8 for example, it was pedal to the metal... all the time. 'I just don't know how to slow down,' he told me once. Speed was in his blood."

"Once I also went off-roading with him in Berthierville. I had no experience in that field, and stayed stuck a couple of times. Good thing he was there to fish me out. The funny thing is, he didn't even remotely care about whether I damaged the engine or the differential of his pick-up. But I had to watch out for the body.

"He could change the motor in a flash, but didn't like doing bodywork. That's just the way he was."

The ongoing evolution of Big Bird is not only being chronicled on "paper", we be doing some videos as well.

The first in the series is on my visit to Fastco to get my wheels and tires installed. Fastco, the wheel manufacturer, agreed to participate in my little project. Let me tell you that they can do some magical things with the right tools, skills and know-how.

In the following video, I tell you why I picked the wheels and tires and then we get to see how it all comes together.

If you know a little about the wheel and tire businesses, you will recognize that Fastco's tooling is at technology's leading edge and that few if any other Canadian wheel manufacturers go to such great lengths to ensure perfection, or damn as near close to it as possible.

Next, I'll have some footage on Big Bird getting its brakes done and then I plan on putting together some track footage.