Fresh Service And Clutch! Carbon Interior And Engine Pkg, Branding Pkg!! on 2040-cars

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Watch a Lamborghini get torn apart by the Taiwanese government

We've all heard tales of the R34 Nissan Skyline GT-R that somehow made it to American roads with questionable registration, only to be confiscated and crushed by officials for being illegally imported. The United States isn't alone in strictly punishing regulation-skirting importers. Just ask the Taiwanese owner of this matte-black Lamborghini Murcielago, or what remains of this Murcielago after it was mauled by a industrial-strength claw. The description on the video gives no clues as to what specific import infraction this Murcielago violated. What's clear is that the government wanted to make an example of its owner, so rather than simply confiscating and crushing the car, they set up shop in the middle of a street, gathered a crowd, and set about tearing the car to bits. The video shows every bit of the destruction, which is at once both rushed and meticulous. The non-stop onslaught reaches every panel, leaving an open, matte-black and Italian tricolore husk. Hopefully the point was made and we won't have to watch anymore beautiful and innocent cars suffer the same fate. Related Video: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.

Volkswagen Group names Paefgen head of classics program

You may remember the name Franz-Josef Paefgen. Until recently, the German engineer and executive was head of both Bentley and Bugatti. Before that he was chief executive of Audi, after working for several years at Ford. He technically "retired" earlier this year, but like the cars he helped create, an executive like Paefgen could never really retire. So it should come as little surprise that the Volkswagen Group has named Dr. Paefgen head of its Classic program.
In his new capacity, Paefgen will oversee the historic automobile activities of the entire VW Group, including those of Volkswagen, Seat, Skoda, Audi, Lamborghini, and of course Bentley and Bugatti. It strikes us as a suitable semi-retirement for the man responsible in no small part for the Bugatti Veyron and Bentley Mulsanne, to name just two, and who was decorated in 2006 by the ACO as the "Spirit of Le Mans" for his contribution to endurance racing. Read the official announcement after the break.

Audi CEO says brand's EVs are almost as profitable as its other cars

After, oh, a hundred years or so of building vehicles primarily powered by internal combustion engines, automakers around the world have been and still are pumping billions of dollars into the development of electric vehicle technology. Everything from platforms and batteries to motors and the software to control it all requires untold hours of development, and that takes time and money. Fortunately, it's not going to take long for that massive investment to start paying off, at least according to Audi CEO Markus Duesmann, who told Reuters in an interview that "The point where we earn as much money with electric cars as with combustion engine cars is now, or ... next year, 2023. They are very even now, the prices." As a brand, Audi contributed more than a quarter of overall profit for the massive Volkswagen Group, which has such powerhouse brands as Volkswagen and Porsche among others. Under the Audi umbrella are Lamborghini, Bentley and Ducati, and it seems those high-end branches aren't going anywhere, at least for now. "These brands ... are very valuable very profitable brands, where we can even expand the synergy level in the future," Duesmann said in the interview. "There are no plans whatsoever to get rid of them." Despite the overall profitability of the brand, the ongoing global chip crisis is causing headaches. "We had a very strong first half in 2021. We do expect a much weaker second half," said Duesmann, who added, "We really have trouble." In fact, so serious is the trouble that the brand is forced into "a day-to-day troubleshooting process" to limit the chip-shortage damage. The good news for the automaker is that Audi has been able to boost its profit margin from 8% prior to the pandemic in 2019 to 10.7% in the first half of 2021. The bad news is that various chip shortages aren't expected to get a whole lot better over the rest of the year. Related video: