German carmakers, which have long favored diesel engines as their primary response to economic and environmental concerns, are scrambling to develop hybrid gasoline-electric cars as sales of these vehicles soar in many places along with fuel prices.
Volkswagen said Thursday it would develop, assemble and sell a hybrid minivan in China in cooperation with a Chinese automaker, a move that underlines the Chinese auto industry's rapid move into an advanced technological area of automotive design.
A day earlier, BMW announced that it would join an existing hybrid technology joint venture set up by DaimlerChrysler and General Motors. It did not say when it would roll out its first hybrid vehicle.
Volkswagen's announcement is its first public confirmation of plans to make and sell a hybrid anywhere in the world. It said it would develop hybrid technology on its own, rather than with a partner, for Europe and the US, according to Reuters.
Toyota, which dominates the market, sold more than 60,000 hybrids in the first six months of this year. It hopes to sell more than a million worldwide by early in the next decade. By 2008, Americans will be able to choose among some two dozen hybrid models from several carmakers.
"Until now," said Arndt Ellinghorst, an auto analyst at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein here, "the Germans thought, `We can make it with diesel.' They saw hybrid as a technology that was just filling a gap. Now they're seeing that, particularly in the US, they're missing a market."
Volkswagen said it planned to develop and build a hybrid Touran minivan, in cooperation with the Shanghai Automotive Industry Corp, and begin marketing it during the Beijing Olympics in 2008. Its announcement signified the first effort by a multinational automaker to develop a hybrid in China.
Honda, Toyota's principal rival in the global market for hybrid vehicles, has not announced plans to build or sell hybrids in China. But a spokesman said the company was aware that fast growth in Chinese auto sales might make hybrids attractive for the market.
For BMW, the decision to join the GM-DaimlerChrysler venture was driven in part by a recognition that more advanced alternatives to fossil fuel, like hydrogen, might be further away than it first thought. BMW has built a version of its luxury 7-series sedan that runs on liquid hydrogen or gasoline.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
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