Toyota agrees to pay $16.4 million U.S. fine - MarketWatch

Toyota agrees to pay $16.4 million U.S. fine - MarketWatch: "WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Toyota Motor Corp. (TM 79.37, -0.69, -0.86%) has agreed to pay a $16.4 million civil fine levied by the U.S. government under an agreement that will allow the company to maintain legally that it didn't knowingly hide defects from regulators, a senior U.S. Transportation Department official said Sunday night."

Toyota recalls 600,000 minivans - MarketWatch

Toyota recalls 600,000 minivans - MarketWatch: "SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) -- Toyota Motor Sales U.S.A. announced Friday a voluntary recall on about 600,000 Sienna minivans because the spare tire could potentially fall on the road and pose a hazard to other vehicles."

worlds biggest auto maker is overtaked by China

China has zoomed past the United States as the world's biggest auto maker and market with sales exceeding 13.64 million units last year, an industry association said here today.

Annual sales of automobiles rose 46.15 per cent year on year to 13.64 million units. China's automobile output also increased 48.3 per cent to 13.79 million units, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) said here.

The full-year sales figure represents an increase of more than 45 per cent from 2008, when 9.4 million units were sold.

Passenger car sales were up 52.93 per cent to 10.33 million units, and production was 10.38 million units, up 54.11 per cent year on year.

China's market still enjoyed abundant potential, as living standards improved and the average auto ownership remained low, Dong Yang, CAAM deputy chairman said.

source:PTI

Brazil auto sales hits all time high

Auto sales in Brazil rose to an all-time high in 2009, capping a year when tax breaks and record-low interest rates helped the country's auto market remain a global bright spot despite the economic downturn. Sales of new cars, light vehicles, trucks and buses rose 16.41 per cent in December from November to 293,030 units, the national dealers' association Fenabrave said.

Tata Nano to launch in US in 3 yrs

Tata Motors may consider launching its ultra-cheap Nano car in the United States in three years, its chairman said on Tuesday, following possible sales in Europe by the end of 2011. Ratan Tata has said his company may produce hybrid versions of the model and that Italy's Fiat and Tata Motors plan to sell the Nano jointly in Latin America. The Nano is billed as the world's cheapest car.

Low cost car by 2012 by Renault and Nissan

Renault, Nissan Motor Co and their Indian partner Bajaj will launch an ultra low-cost car in India in 2012 that will cost less than Tata Motor's Nano, the world's cheapest car.

Hero Honda scales up sales target

Driving high on robust growth during the first half of the current fiscal owing to higher penetration in rural areas and new products, Hero Honda Motors, the country s largest two-wheeler manufacturer, has revised its sales target upwards for the current financial year.

We are going to exceed 40 lakh units handsomely this fiscal, not by a small number but by a big number, Anil Dua, senior vice-president (sales & marketing), said. The company, which had sold 37.22 lakh units in 2008-09, was earlier eyeing a 7.5% growth this fiscal at 40 lakh units. While Dua refused to give the new target for 2009-10, it is expected that the company will register over 10% growth this fiscal.

This comes close on the heels of the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (Siam), the auto industry body, revising the growth targets for 2009-10. Siam said in October that the auto industry would grow by 10% in 2009-10 as against the earlier target of 5%. Hero Honda has recently launched a premium bike, fuel-injected ZMR, along with a new version of Hunk in the premium segment, and a special edition of Splendor+.

Japan's vehicle production at 34 yr low

Japan's vehicle production from April to September plunged 33.5 per cent from a year earlier to 3,855,856 units, recording a 34-year low on the basis of the six-month period, an industry body said.

The production figure of cars, trucks and buses marked the first year-on-year fall in two years and the largest margin of fall for a fiscal first-half period, diving to the lowest level since 3,514,500 units recorded in the April-September period of 1975.

Tata Motors will not launch new models for next 2 yrs

The country's third largest automobile company Tata Motors today said it would not launch new models at least for the next two years.

"We have already invested Rs 2,200 crore for making the Indigo Manza and Indica Vista platforms. We will not launch new models except for the variants of the existing ones for the next two years," Tata Motors Car Product Group General Manager Nitin Seth said.

"Let the investments made give some returns before making new platforms which required huge money," Seth said at the launch of Indigo Manza here.

Tata Motors may check Nano for faulty switches

Tata Motors said it may undertake a pre-emptive check on the 7,500-odd Nanos that have been delivered till date after a faulty combination switch in the world’s cheapest car resulted in fires in at least three cases across the country.

Three cases of fire in the car had been reported in the past few days in Delhi, Lucknow and Ahmedabad. There were no reports of injury or loss of life in any of the incidents.

The country's largest manufacturer of cars and trucks by sales said it was not considering a recall of the car for the time being. It said its experts will check all the cars with customers, purely as a precautionary measure. Unlike in the US and European car markets, recall of cars is not mandatory in India, even in cases of technical faults.

Nano in July, said it was not considering any re-engineering in the car despite the fact that the fires were caused by a common problem in all the cases. The cars were stationary when the fires were reported. Tata Motors has not started to export the car yet. It refused to share the number of Nanos parked at its Pantnagar factory in Uttrakhand and those with dealers.

Sunil Kumar, the owner of the car that caught fire in Delhi, has sought compensation from Tata Motors. Another Nano owner, RH “There seems to be some minor problem in the combination switch area. Of the two cars that we have had access to, this caused smoke and localised melting of plastic parts,” said Tata Motors spokesman Debashish Ray, who chose to play down the incidents.

The company, which started delivering the Rizvi in Lucknow, said, “I had parked my car at the parking lot of a shopping complex near my residence. Within moments, I was informed by the parking attendant that the car was on fire. There was thick smoke in the cabin and I failed to douse the fire.” In a similar incident, another Tata Nano caught fire in Ahmedabad last month due to some technical fault in the battery. Technical experts blame the position of the battery for such incidents.

from:ET

Nano production increased by 20 percent

Aiming to clear the demand backlog for Nano, Tata Motors today said it has increased production of its small car by 20 per cent from this month at its Pantnagar facility.

"We are gearing up for a higher number. We are ramping up our production capacity by 20 per cent from this month.

Post-increase, the sales will be more than 3,000 vehicles per month," Tata Motors' Head for passenger car business Rajiv Dube told reporters here.

Dube said that the company was averaging around 2,500 Nano cars in the last three months.

After pulling out of the small car project from Singur in West Bengal, Tata Motors shifted its manufacturing base in Sanand in Gujarat, which is likely to start operation from the next fiscal. However, to make sure that the deadline was maintained, it started production at the Pantnagar facility.

source :PTI

ICICI Bank today cuts auto loan by 0.5 pc

India's second largest lender, ICICI Bank today cut its auto loans by 0.5 per cent to 10.75-11 per cent with immediate effect. The bank decided to cut rate as a festive offer.

Car sales jump 21 percent in September

Domestic passenger car sales have recorded a 20.61 per cent increase at 1,29,683 units in September from 1,07,517 units in the same month last year.

According to the figures released by the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) today, motorcycle sales in the country during the month was up 6.56 per cent at 6,73,891 units from 6,32,369 units in the corresponding month a year ago.

The total two-wheeler sales in September grew by 7.67 per cent to 8,38,150 units compared to 7,78,424 units in the same period last year.

The sale of commercial vehicles also reported an increase for the second consecutive month and grew by 6.46 per cent in September to 45,451 units from 42,693 units in the year-ago period, SIAM said.

Sales of commercial vehicles have been on a downward spiral for almost a year before bouncing back in July.

HONDA threatens to exit INDIA

In what could be a setback to foreign investor confidence in India, Japanese auto major Honda has threatened to shut operations at its
wholly-owned two-wheeler plant in Haryana due to recurring labour problems.
The company, Honda Motorcycle and Scooter India (HMSI), is the market leader in the scooter segment and has invested around Rs 1,000 crore at its factory in Manesar on the outskirts of Delhi. But recent labour unrest — that has aggravated as the company negotiates a new wage settlement with workers — has crippled the company's production pipeline, forcing it to stop accepting new orders at dealerships.

Production at the plant is down by more than 50% and the labour trouble has meant that a new line for vehicles — the third one since production began — has failed to take off. While no concrete figures are available, it is estimated that the company has suffered a loss of around Rs 250 crore due to a dip in productivity as workers have gone slow and the new line has not started.

This is not the first time the company finds itself facing labour trouble. In 2005, an agitation at the Honda plant hit national headlines when workers were brutally beaten up in a lathicharge by the local police.

Frustrated with the new unrest, HMSI has now petitioned the Punjab and Haryana High Court for relief and said it may shut operations in India if the situation persists. ``...since the product manufactured is of world-class quality, hence there is a demand for the product in the market. But if the present trend continues, the petitioner company (HMSI) may be forced to either to shift production to its other plants worldwide or shift out of the state of Haryana,'' the company's petition before the court said.

Acting on the company's petition that seeks orders to end the strike, the high court has sent notices to the Haryana government and the labour union, asking them to file replies by October 15.

The pullout threat by the company is considered to be a major setback for the Indian automobile industry since the Gurgaon-Manesar belt (often referred to as the Detroit of India) is one of the biggest automobile clusters in India — being home to Maruti and Hero Honda (market leaders in cars and motorcycles) apart from some of the country's biggest auto ancillaries. The area is already under a lot of pressure with labour problems across many companies, including big suppliers like Rico Auto and Sunbeam.

Sources said the current trouble started over the formulation of the new long-term wage settlement after the previous three-year agreement expired on July 31 this year. Mohan Deepak, VP for Industrial Relations at HMSI, said the average cost-to-company (CTC) for a shop-floor worker is currently around Rs 25,000. However, the labour union is now demanding higher fix and variable salary apart from better incentives, something that he says will push their CTC higher than shop floor workers at Hero Honda, the current market leaders with stronger business and production figures.

``This (the demands) is not at all acceptable to us as it is not reasonable. We are ready to pay a reasonable salary depending upon the age and experience of our associates with reasonable hikes to improve their quality of life,'' Deepak said.

Apart from the fully-owned HMSI, Honda has two joint ventures in India — Hero Honda for two-wheelers and Honda Siel Cars for automobiles.

GM's Hummer Brand sold to chinese company

Hummer, the off-road vehicle that once was a symbol of America's love for hulking trucks, is now in the hands of a Chinese heavy equipment maker.

General Motors Co. and Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Corp. finally signed the much-anticipated deal to sell the brand on Friday, according to a joint statement issued by both companies.

Tengzhong will get an 80 percent stake in the company, while Hong Kong investor Suolang Duoji, who indirectly owns a big stake in Tengzhong through an investment company called Sichuan Huatong Investment Holding Co., will get 20 percent.

He also is the controlling shareholder and chairman of Lumena Resources Corp., a Hong Kong listed mining company.

Financial terms were not disclosed, although a person briefed on the deal said the sale price was around $150 million. GM said in its bankruptcy filing last summer that the iconic brand could bring in $500 million or more.

The person did not want to be identified because the terms were being kept private.

The investors also will get Hummer's nationwide dealer network.

GM and Tengzhong said in a statement that the transaction still must be approved by U.S. and Chinese regulators.

Hummer, whose smallest model gets 16 miles per gallon in combined city and highway driving, sold well until the middle part of this decade when fuel prices began to rise. Through September, GM has sold only 8,193 Hummers in the U.S. this year, down 64 percent from the same period last year. In September, only 426 Hummers were sold nationwide, according to Autodata Corp.

GM, which spent 40 days in bankruptcy protection during the summer and has received about $50 billion in U.S. government aid, plans to sell its Hummer and Saab brands and scrap Pontiac and Saturn as it tries to streamline its operations. The company wants to focus on four core brands: Chevrolet, Cadillac, Buick and GMC.

Last week, auto dealership magnate Roger Penske's bid to buy the Saturn brand fell apart just before the deal was finalized when a contract to make vehicles was rejected by the Renault board.

In June, Sichuan Tengzhong announced that it had a tentative agreement with GM to buy the brand, which features large off-road vehicles that initially were developed for military use.

The consumer version of the Hummer H3 and H3T pickup are assembled at the GM plant in Shreveport, La., which is slated for closure no later than June 2012. The larger H2 was made under contract with South Bend, Ind.-based AM General LLC, which also makes military versions of the vehicles. The workhorse military vehicles used in Iraq and Afghanistan are not a part of the deal.

The deal with Sichuan Tengzhong has long been expected. The Michigan Economic Development Authority in September approved a $20.6 million state tax credit over 10 years for Hummer to build a headquarters in the Detroit area.

Bajaj launches Kawasaki Ninja for Rs 2.7 lk

Fuelling competition in the high-end bikes segment, the country's second largest two-wheeler maker Bajaj today launched its much-awaited 250cc motorcycle Kawasaki Ninja, priced at Rs 2.7 lakh (ex-showroom, Delhi).

The 4-stroke bike -- Kawasaki Ninja 250R -- would be retailed exclusively through Bajaj's Probiking showrooms.

Tata Capital auto loans at 10.5 per cent

Tata Capital today offered auto loans at an interest rate of as low as 10.5 per cent on all new car purchases and waived the processing and foreclosure charges.
The offer will be available till October 31 on all fresh loan proposals, the company said, announcing the introduction of the scheme.

"Customers looking out for a quick and hassle-free way of getting an auto loan will now be able to avail the same through Tata Capital's offices across India," it said.
Tata Capital had recently embarked on a new initiative called Consumer Finance and Advisory Business (CFAB) -- an integrated sales and service structure which dovetails all consumer finance and advisory products and services into a single network.

Through CFAB, Tata Capital will offer a diverse mix of retail offerings in the areas of consumer loan products and financial advisory services, including auto loans.

Smoother ride for commercial vehicles as economy recovers

Reflecting signs of recovery in economy, the commercial vehicles segment is slowly driving towards growth path once again, riding on demand mainly from the infrastructure sector.
According to industry players, the commercial vehicle (CV) segment, which returned to positive territory in July after witnessing a downturn for 11 months, is likely to see encouraging sales in the coming months.
As per the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) data, the CV sales in July was up by 9.61 per cent at 37,624 units compared with 34,325 units in the year-ago period. Sales in August also soared by 18.48 per cent at 40,624 units compared with 34,289 units in the same period last year.
As SIAM Senior Director Sugato Sen pointed out, CV sales is intrinsically linked with activities in the infrastructure sector, which is a key driver of the economy.

TVS motor to take steps for certification for Flame

TVS Motor company today said it would take all steps to obtain all necessary certifications under law such as under the Central Motor Vehicles Rules, 1989, before commencing sales of twin spark plug TVS-Flame.

In a press release here, the company said that in the matter relating to the patent dispute between the company and Bajaj, the Supreme court, in its September 16 order, has allowed TVS to sell the twin spark plug TVS-Flame.
Accordingly, necessary steps would be taken, it said

TVS to launch twin spark Flame after SC boost

Two-wheeler maker TVS Motor Company today said it will start selling its 125cc bike Flame with twin-spark technology after the Supreme Court allowed it to sell the motorcycle.
"The company will take steps to obtain all necessary certifications required under law, such as under the Central Motor Vehicles Rules, 1989, before commencing sales of twin spark plug TVS-Flame," the Chennai-based firm said in a statement.
Last week, the Supreme Court allowed TVS to make and sell the Flame that sports twin-spark plugs, the technology for which Bajaj Auto claims to hold patent.
However, a Bench headed by Justice Markandey Katju, while disposing of Bajaj's petition, asked the single judge of the Madras High Court, where the two parties were initially fighting a legal battle, to hold day-to-day hearing and decide the matter before November 30.