2001 Chrysler Prowler on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Fiat buying rest of Chrysler in $4.35 billion deal, IPO avoided

Chrysler will now become a wholly owned member of the Fiat family, as it's been announced that the 41.46-percent stake in the Auburn Hills, MI-based manufacturer owned by the United Auto Workers' VEBA trust fund will be sold to the Italian company. Concluding the agreement will mark the closure of a piecemeal purchase process that could have resulted in an initial public offering.
The total cost of the sale will see the VEBA healthcare trust receive $4.35 billion, $3.65 billion of which will come from Fiat. $1.75 billion of that will be cash, while an additional $1.9 billion will be part of a "special distribution." An additional $700 million will be paid over four separate installments according to reports from Automotive News Europe and USA Today, although the shares will belong to Fiat following the first payment. The deal was reportedly initially struck on Sunday (though it is just being announced today), and is being portrayed as particularly good news for Fiat and Chrysler, which have now prevented the remaining shares going to the stock market in a UAW-forced IPO.
"The unified ownership structure will now allow us to fully execute our vision of creating a global automaker that is truly unique in terms of mix of experience, perspective and know-how, a solid and open organization that will ensure all employees a challenging and rewarding environment," Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne said in a statement.

Chrysler 300 performance model teased for Detroit Auto Show reveal

The Chrysler 300 will not go out quietly, both literally and figuratively. A new teaser from Chrysler blasted across the company website’s homepage tells the story of whatÂ’s going on here. ItÂ’s a photo of what we have to assume is the wheel and brake caliper of what Chrysler plans on revealing September 13. The car this wheel and caliper are attached to? A Chrysler 300. Yes, it appears as though Chrysler is going to reveal a performance model of the 300 next week, and weÂ’re excited about it. Chrysler doesnÂ’t divulge much about the car, but the description attached to the photo tells us a few things. WeÂ’ll re-paste the text from the teaser below for easy reading. “Tune in September 13th at 6:00 p.m. ET to get a front-row seat for the reveal of one of the most powerful and luxurious special edition vehicles in Chrysler Brand history. WeÂ’ll also share details on how you can reserve a vehicle of your own from this limited production run. Limited Quantities available. Vehicle availability in Spring 2023. Visit your dealer for vehicle availability.” What could this be? For starters, thereÂ’s precedent for a Chrysler 300 SRT8 re-creation. Chrysler discontinued this muscle sedan after the 2014 model year, and in the end it had a 6.4-liter V8 under its hood that made 470 horsepower and 470 pound-feet of torque. Today, that 6.4-liter V8 can be found under the hood of the 300Â’s sibling car, the Dodge Charger R/T Scat Pack where it makes 485 horsepower and 470 pound-feet of torque. It seems reasonable that Chrysler could bring the big 6.4-liter back to the 300 as a sendoff — after all, the Charger and Challenger in their current forms are being discontinued after the 2023 model year. The caliper design looks like that found on the current Scat Pack cars, but itÂ’s only a glimpse of the wheel and brakes, so we canÂ’t be 100% sure about anything. As much as weÂ’d love to see Chrysler stick a Hellcat engine inside the 300 as its final hurrah, that theory is definitely the longshot at this point. Chrysler says this model will be “one of the most powerful” special edition vehicles in its history, but it didnÂ’t explicitly call it the most powerful car its ever made. If that was ChryslerÂ’s wording, weÂ’d have to assume it would be a Hellcat, but thatÂ’s not the case here. Regardless of what performance level 300 comes at us on Tuesday next week, weÂ’re hyped. Make sure to tune back in here to see what Chrysler has in store for us.

This forgotten Chrysler was its bid for Humvee contract

Today, the Humvee might be as associated with the dead automotive brand from General Motors as it is with the hard-working truck that has long served as one of the backbone vehicles of America's military. But Autoline host John McElroy is showing off a practically unknown part of the model's story by digging out some old photos from his personal archive.
The High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle project, better known today as the Humvee, can be traced back to a US Department of Defense request for bids to build a new military truck. According to McElroy, he was invited to the Chrysler proving grounds in 1981 to check out the bid from the brand's defense division. The company's concept was that it might be able to build an inexpensive, capable vehicle by using off-the-shelf parts.
The angular body panels gave the truck a look almost like a modern, stealth vehicle. However, the flat look was actually just to make the tooling as cheap as possible to produce. Still, this Chrysler looked surprisingly futuristic for the early '80s. It's actually not too far away from the famous Lamborghini LM002, itself intended as a possible military-spec machine.