More good news for the British auto industry

Following the news of Jaguar Land Rover announcing a net profit and re-entry of Lotus into F1, there is more good news for the British auto industry.

The British Government recently announced £381 mil. support for Ford motor and Nissan and has extended a £20.7 mil. grant to Nissan. Nissan plans to manufacture their Leaf electric car for the European car market at it's plant in Sunderland here in the UK.

Nissan Leaf at the 2009 Tokyo Motor Show: Tennen-Gas

For your info, the Leaf is a five-seater hatchback and said to have a range of 100 miles with top speed of more than 90 mph.

New Template for Auto Lah

It has been a while since I changed my template and decided that now would be a good time to do so. I was getting bored with the old look.

So what do you think of the new template?

It does motivate me to keep it updated with more car news everyday.

Dr. Mahathir talks about Proton

Dr.Mahathir bin Mohamad is the former Prime Minister of Malaysia. He is an advisor to Proton, the Malaysian car company which was also his brainchild.

Anyway, he recently wrote about Proton's progress in his blog and how he was surprised that the Lotus racing team was able to get their car ready in such a short time. They just debuted this season.

In case you were not aware, Lotus is owned by Proton and Lotus Racing is run by 1Malaysia F1 Team Sdn. Bhd., a partnership between Government of Malaysia (through Proton) and a consortium of Malaysian entrepreneurs. The Team’s principal is Tony Fernandes , CEO of Malaysian budget airline Air Asia.

Play online Continental Tyres game and win PS3

Continental Tyres has just released a new online game called 'Test My Driving'. Test your driving skills and there are giveaways for the best scores, including a Sony Playstation 3 as the top prize.



Not related, but according to arecent survey conducted by Continental, people who pass their driving test on their second time are safer than those who pass first time. Going by this, I guess I am a safe driver because I passed my driving tests - both in Malaysia as well as in the UK, the second time round.

Green Ferrari

Never thought I would hear the two words "Ferrari" and "Green" together but as they say ...

Ferrari recently unveiled their the 599 GTB Fiorano, their HY-KERS vettura laboratorio (experimental vehicle) at the Geneva Motor Show. The car features a electric motor mated with a V12 petrol engine. The electric motor powers the power steering, power-assisted brakes, air conditioning and on-board systems.

According to Ferrari the vehicle reduces CO2 emissions on the ECE + EUDC combined cycle by 35 per cent.

More info here.

Euro NCAP tests gets tougher

Just read the latest Today, Euro NCAP crash test results for five new cars,viz., the Citroen Nemo, the Kia Venga, the Nissan Cube, the Seat Exeo and the Toyota Verso.

Only the Toyota Verso, receives Euro NCAP’s maximum five star rating.

This is due to the fact that Euro NCAP has raised the bar for carmakers to achieve five stars across three areas of safety protection:
Performance thresholds for Adult Occupant Protection - from 70% previously to 75%
Child Occupant Protection - 75% to 80%
Pedestrian Protection - from from 25% to 40%.

The Toyota Verso received good scores in all areas and an huge 69% in pedestrian protection.

Please visit the Euro NCAP site for more info

Jaguar starts making money

Here's some good news from the UK auto industry. Jaguar Land Rover has announced a net profit of £55m (US$140.7 million)in the last three months of 2009. The profit came from increased sales (more than 165,000 models)outside the UK. The biggest markets were Russia, Europe, North America and China.


Other related links:

• Tata Motors profits boosted by Jaguar Land Rover
• Jaguar Starts Making Money for Tata Motors
• Jaguar Land Rover makes £55m in return to profit