1999 Cadillac Eldorado on 2040-cars

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Lansing builds its millionth Cadillac

Cadillacs are built at plants across North America. The Escalade is assembled in Texas, the SRX in Mexico and the XTS in Ontario. But the bulk of Cadillac's lineup - or the smaller members of the family, at least - are built in Michigan. And while the upcoming ELR will be built alongside the Chevy Volt at the Detroit/Hamtramck facility (which incidentally opened with the Cadillac Eldorado back in '86), the majority of those Cadillacs built in Michigan are handled by the Lansing Grand River Assembly Plant.
In fact, Lansing Grand River just celebrated its millionth Cadillac built. The landmark millionth vehicle is a new 2014 CTS sedan in Red Obsession Tintcoat. The facility opened in 2001 and has built Cadillacs almost exclusively since then, assembling the CTS and ATS model lines, though in a couple of years it will also handle production of the Chevy Camaro.

Frustrated GM investors ask what more Mary Barra can do

DETROIT — General Motors Co Chief Executive Mary Barra has transformed the No. 1 U.S. automaker in her almost five years in charge, but that is still not enough to satisfy investors. Ahead of third-quarter results due on Oct. 31, GM shares are trading about 6 percent below the $33 per share price at which they launched in 2010 in a post-bankruptcy initial public offering. The Detroit carmaker's stock is down 22 percent since Barra took over in January 2014. After hitting an all-time high of $46.48 on Oct. 24, 2017, the shares have declined 33 percent. In the same period, the Standard & Poor's 500 index has climbed 7.8 percent. Several shareholders contacted by Reuters said GM could face a third major action by activist shareholders in less than four years if the share price does not improve. "I've been expecting it," said John Levin, chairman of Levin Capital Strategies. "It just seems a tempting morsel to somebody." Levin's firm owns more than seven million GM shares. Barra has guided the company through the settlement of a federal criminal probe of a mishandled safety recall, sold off money-losing European operations, and returned $25 billion to shareholders through dividends and stock buybacks from 2012 through 2017. GM declined to comment for this story, but the company's executives privately express frustration with the market's reluctance to see it as anything more than a manufacturer tied mainly to auto market sales cycles. GM's profitable North American truck and SUV business and its money-making China operations are valued at just $14 billion, excluding the value of GM's stake in its $14.6 billion Cruise automated vehicle business and its cash reserves from its $44 billion market capitalization. The recent slump in the Chinese market, GM's largest, and plateauing U.S. demand are ratcheting up the pressure. GM is one of the few global automakers without a founding family or a government to serve as a bulwark against corporate raiders. In 2015, a group led by investor Harry Wilson pressed GM to launch a $5 billion share buyback, and commit to what is now an $18 billion ceiling on the level of cash the company would hold. In 2017, GM fended off a call by hedge fund manager David Einhorn to split its common stock shares into two classes. Einhorn, whose firm still owned more than 21 million shares at the end of June, declined to comment about GM's stock price. Other investors said there were no clear alternatives to Barra's approach.

Cadillac teases CT4 and CT5 V-Series Blackwing steering wheel

There's quite a bit that we know about the upcoming Cadillac V-Series Blackwing models. Thanks to spy shooters and prototypes, we've seen the CT4-V and CT5-V Blackwing out and about testing on public roads, which means we've seen the bronze wheels in staggered sizes. We've been told they will offer proper manual transmissions, and we know they will lap a race track quicker than the ATS-V and CTS-V they replace. And now we know what their steering wheels will look like. It's not much to base an entire teaser on, but there are a few interesting tidbits we can glean from Caddy's first official Blackwing tease. First, the wheel itself. It's leather wrapped (not Alcantra, at least on this example), it looks to have meaty bulges where you'll want to grip it, it has a red strip at the top to help locate straight ahead while driving aggressively, and it has a carbon fiber V-shaped spoke at the bottom. Finally, we see a prominent silver button labeled "V" on the left side that will allow drivers to quickly access V-Mode. To the right will be buttons for the Performance Traction Management system. Judging by the fuzzy background behind the wheel that shows some sort of digital gauge cluster, it seems that Cadillac may be aiming for a 200-mile-per-hour top speed for the CT5-V. That's not a stretch, as the last-generation CTS-V could hit that speed, too. Cadillac smartly took this shot in a way that blurs the center console, which means there's plenty more time to speculate on the transmission choices. Cadillac says the V-Series Blackwing models will be ready in time for the summer of 2021. Stay tuned. Related Video: