2007 Porsche 911 Gt3 on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Ferraris, Porsches and planes star at McCall’s Motorworks Revival

MONTEREY, Calif. – McCall's Motorworks Revival, sometimes called The Jet Party, kicked off vintage car week here as enthusiasts streamed into the region for days of car shows, official automaker events and hob-knobbing leading up to Sunday's Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance. Held at the Monterey Jet Center, the revival featured an array of exotic and classic cars blended in with planes, racecars, motorcycles and luxury items like jewelry. This year the eclectic lineup of cars included vintage Ferraris and Porsches, a raised 1964 Chevy Impala, a classic Toyota Land Cruiser and a Cobra. The 1960s Ford GT40 racecar sat near the modern Ford GT, while Camilo Pardo, the designer of the in-between generation (2004-06), held court nearby. Iconic planes like the B25, P51 and an ancient biplane were intermingled with the flashy cars. Show-goers tipped drinks, tossed back heavy hors d'oeuvres and desserts, ogled the seemingly random collection of amazing machines and prepared for days of celebrating the automobile on the Monterey Peninsula. The revival is in its 26th year and is put on by McCall Events, whose owner Gordon McCall is a class judge at the concours and the cofounder another Monterey car week staple, the Quail. The revival also collects donations for a California police charity. Related Video: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. Featured Gallery McCall's Motorworks Revival 2017 View 29 Photos Image Credit: Copyright 2017 Drew Phillips / Autoblog.com Ferrari Lamborghini Porsche Coupe Motorcycle Luxury Performance Pebble Beach

Automakers paying Chinese dealers for lower-than-expected sales

The Chinese dealers vs. foreign manufacturers story won't quit. It began with a story on the struggles faced by FAW-Toyota joint venture dealers, with supposedly 95 percent of the showrooms losing money, and 10 percent of them doing so poorly that they'd have to exit the business. The problem is mandated sales targets, most set when the country's economy was racing. Now that things have slowed, China's dealers are swimming in unsold cars and the costs to keep them. In the case of FAW-Toyota, dealers asked Toyota to hand over 2.2 billion yuan ($355 million) to help address the situation. That was followed by a report noting the issues that Honda, BMW, and Nissan dealers are having with the same issue, revealing that the Chinese Automobile Dealers Association (CADA) had taken the highly unusual step of writing to the Chinese government to complain. Now Reuters reports that CADA is not only pressing its case even harder, it's being open about it: it announced that BMW agreed to pay dealers 5.1 billion yuan ($820 million) to alleviate poor profits last year. Unnamed sources said Audi has thrown 2 billion yuan into the kitty for subsidies, and Daimler has contributed "about 1 billion yuan" to its dealers. The battle isn't just about 2014, but how business will be run in 2015 as well: Chinese Porsche dealers have requested the automaker lower its 2015 target of 64,000 cars, which would be a 40-percent increase on its 2014 sales of 46,931 vehicles. One analyst called it "shocking" that the CADA has taken its fight public, while CADA comments continue to imply that dealers have been railroaded to the cliff's edge without recourse. "Due to the difference in status," it's deputy secretary said, "individual dealers are not willing to, or don't dare to, talk frankly with the carmakers...." Both parties need one another, so they'll figure out a way to make it work – but that could mean acknowledging the Chinese market is behaving more like a mature one, not an emerging one. News Source: ReutersImage Credit: Lintao Zhang/Getty Images Earnings/Financials Audi BMW Porsche Toyota Car Dealers Luxury

Winterkorn remains CEO of Volkswagen's majority shareholder

Martin Winterkorn may have stepped down as the chief executive of Volkswagen in the wake of the diesel emissions scandal, but he's not out from under the company's large umbrella just yet. In fact, according to a report from Reuters, he still holds four top-level positions not only within the industrial giant's bureaucracy, but at the top of it. And one of those is as CEO of the company's largest shareholder. That holding company is Porsche SE, the investment arm of the Piech and Porsche families (Ferdinand Porsche's descendants) which holds over 50 percent of VW's shares. In 2008, Porsche SE acquired majority interest in the Volkswagen Group which in turn acquired Porsche the automaker – and placed VW's Winterkorn at the head of the executive board of the holding company. Though Winterkorn has resigned from his position as chairman of VW's management board, he has apparently yet to step down from running Porsche SE. That's not the only job that Winterkorn still retains in VW's senior management. He also continues to serve as chairman of Audi, as well as truck manufacturer Scania, and the new Truck & Bus GmbH into which Scania has been grouped together with Man. It remains unclear if or when Winterkorn might resign from those positions as well, or how his tenure in those posts might affect the company's effort to start over in the aftermath of the scandal in which it is currently embroiled. Also unclear, Reuters reports, is how much, exactly, Winterkorn will receive in compensation after having stepped down from his chair at the head of the VW executive board. His pension is reported at over $30 million, but he could be awarded a large severance package as well amounting to as much as two years' worth of his annual compensation, which amounted to around $18 million last year. Whether he receives the severance pay or not is expected to depend on whether his resignation is considered by the supervisory board to have been the result of his own missteps or independent of the situation that resulted in his resignation. One way or another, he's not likely to go poor anytime soon.