With sales tanking and General Motors (GM) and Chrysler struggling for their very survival, the Detroit auto show promises to be a subdued and tense affair as automakers launch new models to compete for an ever-dwindling number of customers.
Some 58 new models — including 44 worldwide debuts — will be introduced in the coming days as the manufacturers vie for the attention of nearly 7,000 journalists from more than 60 countries at press previews.
Daimler was the first to launch its latest high-ticket vehicle, the new Mercedes E-class luxury sedan, at an invitation-only cocktail reception on Saturday night.
“Despite the enormous pressures that our entire industry is under these days, we are facing the year 2009 with measured confidence,” Daimler chief executive officer Dieter Zetsche said.
“The best way to master a crisis is driving the change instead of being driven by it,” Zetsche said, adding that “there will be a bright future for innovative car companies ... and I most certainly include Daimler among them.”
Prominent among the new offerings are a host of ready-for-market hybrids and experimental electric vehicles that were to start zipping around a tree-lined track set up in the basement of the Detroit convention center yesterday.
The testing track surrounds two ponds with waterfalls and will showcase zero-emission electric prototypes by GM, Ford, Toyota, Honda, Mitsubishi and Tesla.
Ford will also be introducing two new hybrids that it said got better fuel economy than Toyota’s popular Prius.
Refusing to be upstaged, Toyota will launch an improved version of its Prius and a new dedicated hybrid for its luxury Lexus brand and said on Saturday that it would launch a two-seater electric car by 2012.
China’s BYD Auto will be showing the first mass-produced plug-in hybrid that went on sale last month in China and is slated to hit Europe next year.
Honda will also enter the fray by unveiling its reintroduced dedicated hybrid, the Insight hatchback.
But in a sign of the troubled times, the Japanese automaker canceled a press conference for the Insight, which was to make its worldwide debut without fanfare in the Honda booth when the show opened yesterday.
And a number of automakers decided to skip the show altogether this year, including Nissan, Suzuki, Porsche, Ferrari and Land Rover.
“Beyond the products and the lights and the glitz, everyone is in a holding pattern,” said Karl Brauer, editor-in-chief of the automotive Web site Edmunds.com. “Uncertainty is the underlying tension.”
A financial crisis, credit crunch and deepening recession pushed US sales down 18 percent last year, in the steepest decline in 29 years and to the lowest level since 1992.
This year is expected to be even worse, with US auto sales forecast to fall by another 1 million or 2 million vehicles to around 11 million to 12 million vehicles.
Sales have not been below 12 million since the recession of 1982, when the US had 74 million fewer people than today.
While nearly every automaker posted significant losses and has announced major production cuts last year, Detroit’s Big Three were the hardest hit and saw their combined US market share fall below 50 percent for the first time.
Their US market share topped 60 percent as recently as 2004 and was 71.2 percent just 10 years ago, Ward’s Auto said.
Despite years of painful restructuring that had the trio on the road to recovery, the US government was forced to extend billions in loans to cash-strapped GM and Chrysler last month after sales dropped off precipitously in September.
RETHINK? The defense ministry and Navy Command Headquarters could take over the indigenous submarine project and change its production timeline, a source said Admiral Huang Shu-kuang’s (黃曙光) resignation as head of the Indigenous Submarine Program and as a member of the National Security Council could affect the production of submarines, a source said yesterday. Huang in a statement last night said he had decided to resign due to national security concerns while expressing the hope that it would put a stop to political wrangling that only undermines the advancement of the nation’s defense capabilities. Taiwan People’s Party Legislator Vivian Huang (黃珊珊) yesterday said that the admiral, her older brother, felt it was time for him to step down and that he had completed what he
Taiwan has experienced its most significant improvement in the QS World University Rankings by Subject, data provided on Sunday by international higher education analyst Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) showed. Compared with last year’s edition of the rankings, which measure academic excellence and influence, Taiwanese universities made great improvements in the H Index metric, which evaluates research productivity and its impact, with a notable 30 percent increase overall, QS said. Taiwanese universities also made notable progress in the Citations per Paper metric, which measures the impact of research, achieving a 13 percent increase. Taiwanese universities gained 10 percent in Academic Reputation, but declined 18 percent
CHINA REACTS: The patrol and reconnaissance plane ‘transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,’ the 7th Fleet said, while Taipei said it saw nothing unusual The US 7th Fleet yesterday said that a US Navy P-8A Poseidon flew through the Taiwan Strait, a day after US and Chinese defense heads held their first talks since November 2022 in an effort to reduce regional tensions. The patrol and reconnaissance plane “transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,” the 7th Fleet said in a news release. “By operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law, the United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations.” In a separate statement, the Ministry of National Defense said that it monitored nearby waters and airspace as the aircraft
UNDER DISCUSSION: The combatant command would integrate fast attack boat and anti-ship missile groups to defend waters closest to the coastline, a source said The military could establish a new combatant command as early as 2026, which would be tasked with defending Taiwan’s territorial waters 24 nautical miles (44.4km) from the nation’s coastline, a source familiar with the matter said yesterday. The new command, which would fall under the Naval Command Headquarters, would be led by a vice admiral and integrate existing fast attack boat and anti-ship missile groups, along with the Naval Maritime Surveillance and Reconnaissance Command, said the source, who asked to remain anonymous. It could be launched by 2026, but details are being discussed and no final timetable has been announced, the source