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800k car names trademarked globally, suddenly alphanumerics seem reasonable

What's in a name? This cliched phrase probably gets tossed out at every marketing meeting that happens when a new car gets its nomenclature. We know the answer, though: everything. The name of a car has all the potential to make or break it with fickle customers that are more conscious than ever about what their purchases say about them.
That's giving headaches to marketing folks across the automotive industry. "It's tough. In 1985 there were about 75,000 names trademarked in the automotive space. Today there are 800,000," Chevrolet's head of marketing, Russ Clark, told Automotive News. Infiniti's president, Johan de Nysschen, echoed Clark's sentiment, saying, "The truth of the matter is, across the world, there is hardly a name or a letter that hasn't already been claimed by one car manufacturer or another. You can go through the alphabet - A, B, C and so forth - and you will quickly see that almost all available letters are taken."
What has that left automakers to do? Get creative. In the case of Infiniti, it made the controversial move to bring all of its cars' names into a new scheme, classifying them as Q#0 for cars and QX#0 for SUVs and crossovers. So the Infiniti G, which was available as the G25 and G37, is now the Q50. The FX37 and FX50 are now the QX70.

Race Recap: 2015 Hungarian Grand Prix is Magyar for 'What a race!'

Every driver on the Formula 1 grid dreams of taking home the silverware, but only one driver each year can do it. Barring disaster in 2015 it looks like it's going to be Lewis Hamilton. The Brit has been so dominating at the front of the grid on Saturday, we can't see how he'll miss out on winning the second annual FIA Pole Position Trophy. That's the accolade introduced last season in another manufactured attempt to give drivers something to work for on Saturday, since the FIA felt leading into the first corner didn't have the pull it used to. Hamilton took his ninth pole of the season in Hungary for Mercedes-AMG Petronas with a crushing lap that put him almost six tenths ahead of his teammate Nico Rosberg in second. All Hamilton needs is one more spot at the top of the grid this season, and he's the Pole Position trophy winner. Thrilling stuff. Behind Rosberg the gaps stayed smaller, Sebastian Vettel in the Ferrari a little more than a tenth behind Rosberg, Daniel Ricciardo in the Infiniti Red Bull Racing less than four one-hundredths behind Vettel. We feel almost as vexed watching Kimi Raikkonen as he feels driving – he's finally got a good Ferrari, now he can't get a good weekend. The front wing broke on his car in Free Practice 1, then a water leak in Free Practice 3 robbed him of setup time on the soft tire. He lines up in fifth about two tenths behind Ricciardo. The slow, tight Hungaroring didn't agree with the Williams chassis, Valtteri Bottas the first of the Grove team drivers in sixth, his teammate Felipe Massa two places back. Between them is Daniil Kvyat in the second Red Bull in seventh. Teenager Max Verstappen put in a good showing in the Toro Rosso to grab ninth, while Romain Grosjean in a wriggling, squishy, sliding Lotus classified his appearance in Q3 at all as "a miracle." As for the race that followed, we don't expect to see another like it for a long time – it was the real thrilling stuff, one shock after another. The drama began after the first parade lap, when Felipe Massa lined up out of position and the start was aborted. The drivers did another parade lap, then lined up with everyone in place. Mercedes got swamped as soon as the lights went out. Vettel ran around both of them and led the race into the first turn, Raikkonen had come from fifth to third by Turn 1, then got the inside line on Rosberg through Turn 2 to take second place.

Infiniti bringing Q50 Eau Rouge to Geneva, now with engine [w/video]

During last month's Detroit Auto Show, Infiniti rolled out the lustrous Q50 Moulin Eau Rouge concept - a preview of what could be a solid performance offering from Nissan's luxury arm. Problem is, the car shown in Detroit was all show and no go - literally.
Infiniti was keen to talk about how the Eau Rouge would feature "a big personality, V-cylinder engine with forced induction" with "over 500 horsepower and 600 pound-feet of torque," but the showcar had no such powerplant underhood. In fact, it didn't have any powerplant under the hood at all. That'll change next month, however, as Infiniti has now confirmed that it will bring the Q50 Eau Rouge to the Geneva Motor Show in March, complete with the promised "big personality" engine.
"Our engineers have perfectly captured the tone of Infiniti's take on premium performance, and a car that is as impressive as the Q50 Eau Rouge sounds is surely a car to challenge performance cars in the premium sector," said Infiniti's President, Johan de Nysschen. Regarding that sound: he ain't foolin' - the automaker has released a teaser video that gives us our first listen at what the Q50 Eau Rouge will sound like once its powerplant is nestled underhood. Scroll down to give it a watch - err, listen - and have a look beyond that for the company's official press blast.