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Mercedes says it's tops in luxury sales for 2012, not BMW

It turns out that Mercedes-Benz North America has legitimate claim to being the top selling luxury nameplate in the US in 2012.
While sources such as Autodata had put BMW in the top spot, registration data from R.L. Polk shows that Mercedes customers registering new vehicles topped the Bavarian automaker in the most recent calendar year. Polk says Benz posted 274,123 registrations, compared with BMW's 268,498.
In terms of sales posted, BMW had bested Benz 281,460 to 274,134. But sales are recorded somewhat inconsistently from automaker to automaker. Some book the sales as soon as they are shipped from factory to dealer. There is perennial gamesmanship between the two German rivals, and the sales numbers suggest that BMW pushed out some extra sheetmetal to dealers in the last four weeks of the year.

Recharge Wrap-up: Uber,'s free BMW 7 Series rides, Belfast's DeLorean EV

BMW used Uber to give people free rides in the new 7 Series. While the new generation of BMW's luxury flagship goes on sale in the US on October 24, lucky Uber customers in New York, Miami, Chicago and Los Angeles got a sneak preview and free ride on October 17 and 18. The partnership also allowed potential customers to test drive the car with a BMW product specialist. "With our new 7 Series being the most innovative vehicle in its class, it's only fitting that we partnered with Uber to offer a unique and exciting way to experience our flagship model prior to retail launch," says BMW's Jason Chan. Read more from BMW. BMW is using manure to power its South Africa production facility. As part of a broader goal to get all its energy from renewable sources, BMW will get as much as 4.4 megawatts of electricity from a biogas plant that produces power from gas emitted by manure and other organic waste. At full capacity, it will supply about 25 to 30 percent of the BMW plant's power. "We are a big consumer, so that's a lot," says BMW spokesman Diederik Reitsma. "It's waste no longer wasted." Read more at Bloomberg. Visa Europe has extended it partnership with Formula E. Visa Europe signed on as the Official Payment Partner of the electric racing series for the European leg of last season, and has now expanded its commitment for the next three seasons. The company lends its name to the championship's Visa Fastest Lap Trophy. "Formula E is driving the change towards an electric future and reinventing motorsport, while here at Visa, we're reinventing payments by pioneering technologies to make payments faster, simpler and more secure," says Visa Europe's sales and marketing chief, Mark Antipof. "We seek partners that match our commitment to innovation and leadership, so it was therefore natural for us to extend our support of this evolutionary sport through a global sponsorship for the next three years." Read more from Formula E. Queen's University Belfast is set to unveil its electric DeLorean DMC-12 on October 21, 2015. The date is notable for being the day to which Marty McFly traveled in Back To The Future using Doc Brown's DeLorean time machine. In what is likely the first DeLorean to be built in Northern Ireland since 1983, students and staff from the university's School of Electronics, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science have restored the car and converted it to run on electricity.

Park your BMW with a wave, 3D instrument clusters, and more

Remote parking your car with a smartphone app is so 2015. In the future envisioned by BMW, you can park your car by giving it hand gestures. Meanwhile, the car will sync with your smart home and display traffic information on your hallway mirror. It's all part of a giant list of concepts and technologies BMW is bringing to the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show. Let's break down some of the big ideas BMW's bringing to this year's CES. Park By Waving Actually, you don't even need to wave to get this i3 Concept to start moving. From inside your house, simply picking up the key can signal your connected garage door to open and tell your car to pull out into the driveway. Out in the wider world this concept takes automated parking a step further than current in-car parking assistance systems. Once a spot is found, the driver gets out and waves at the car. The i3 then does all the movement on its own. What's the benefit of watching your car park instead of sitting inside while it parks itself? Not much, other that the ability to fit into narrow parking spaces. But I'm a sucker for automation like this, as long as it works better than those infernal foot-kick tailgate opening systems. The Bumper That Snitches For You If you have a car already covered in cameras, why not use them for more than parking? Bumper Detect is BMW's take on the valet-mode recording in the Chevrolet Corvette. But instead of filming any motion, BMW's system monitors the body and bumpers for any unexpected impacts and immediately captures the footage. An alert goes to the driver's smartphone via the BMW Connected App, with available live streaming images. Samsung Smart Things And The Smart Home The i3 on display at CES intergrates Samsung's Smart Things app into the iDrive controller. This allow you to use connected smart home features inside the car, like turning off lights or adjusting the thermostat. BMW's vision further into future integrates the car into the home even more with what the automaker calls Open Mobility Cloud. You can call it a personal assistant or an evil digital spy, depending on your perspective of this kind on technology. In any case, Open Mobility Cloud uses predictive algorithms to plan the day and give relevent information through BMW's smartphone app or – in a super futuristic way – a Mobility Mirror inside the house.