Fiat-Chrysler’s CEO Sergio Marchionne says he's still not positively disposed toward hybrids, but the company will be forced to begin producing them to meet 2025 emission mandates.
"I have no other way of getting to 2025 [CAFE] numbers than by going to hybrids," he told Automotive News of sales to the North American market.
What’s wrong with hybrids in Marchionne’s estimation? They’re relatively expensive to produce and he said he is skeptical whether they would not only sell in low volume, so it would be a losing proposition.
According to a recent study by GfK Automotive, consumers have mostly shifted to smaller compact gas vehicles of late, with many having decided that saving money on fuel is worth sacrificing a little in the way of space—just not too much.
Chrysler will add a hybrid gas-electric minivan to its lineup as early as 2013, Chief Executive Sergio Marchionne said Tuesday. This follows news from the 2011 Detroit auto show that Chrysler will produce a gas-electric hybrid version of the Chrysler 300 by 2013. Marchionne made the announcement while addressing workers at Chrysler’s assembly plant in Windsor, Canada.
Chrysler is working on a hybrid version of the Chrysler 300 sedan, according to a report in Automotive News. "We will offer a hybrid variant of the 300 equipped with an eight-speed automatic in 2013," CEO Sergio Marchionne said last week at the Detroit auto show. The statement follows years of false starts on hybrid vehicles from the company.
Three Indiana pension funds today asked the Supreme Court to stop Chrysler's sale to FIAT, arguing (among other things) that the US Treasury Department overstepped its legal authority by using bailout funds for Chrysler when Congress intended the money for banks. Those same bailout funds are also the key to Chrysler’s plans for plug-in hybrids and electric cars.
If the proposed alliance between Chrysler and FIAT goes through, the company could produce a total of six new models—ranging in size from small to smaller. Delivering these cars to market could will take about two years. In the meantime, Chrysler is in survival mode.
What a new world we live in these days: a black president (hurray!), the worst economy since the Depression (oh, dear), and now…even Detroit is changing its wanton ways. Here are five pieces of ironclad evidence that Hell has now well and truly frozen over in southeastern Michigan.
Cerberus, the private company behind Chrysler, is investing $2 million in lobbying efforts to send big name players, like former VP Dan Quayle, to Congress to make the pitch for a bailout.
US auto sales last month plunged 32 percent from October 2007 levels. General Motors took the biggest hit, a jaw-dropping 45-percent decline. Hidden in the dismal industry numbers were a couple of hybrid oddities. You might view them as thrillers: The Case of the Missing Hybrids, double-billed with Last Hybrid Standing.
It appears that Chrysler will discontinue the Dodge Durango and Chrysler Aspen full-sized hybrids just two months after both vehicles began full-scale production.
