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Recharge Wrap-up: Infiniti considers EV for China, NextEV hires former Tesla, Apple engineer

NextEV has hired Tesla Autopilot and Apple veteran Jamie Carlson as Senior Director of Advanced Technologies. The seasoned autonomous driving engineer joins fellow former Autopilot engineer Kurt Thywissen, who is now NextEV Senior Director of Human-Machine Interaction. NextEV, which is working on an all-electric supercar before focusing on mainstream EVs, recently obtained a self-driving car permit from California and opened its North American headquarters in San Jose. Read more at Electrek. Infiniti is considering launching its first EV in China. "When I think about EV, we design it for China definitely, even as the first market to launch," says Infiniti President Roland Krueger. "We are discussing this internally constantly what is the right timing for Infiniti to have such vehicles." Infiniti has held back on launching an EV, focusing instead on hybrids, but says it could be "very fast" in deploying an EV once it decides to do so. Having Nissan and Renault backing Infiniti, the luxury brand is confident about its access to proven EV technology. Read more at Automotive News Europe. Thrifty car rental has added a Tesla Model S to its fleet in Canberra, Australia. Available at the Canberra Airport, it's the first luxury EV offered for rent from a mainstream rental company in Australia. Australia's capital offers a small registration discount and no stamp duty for EVs, making it a cheaper and more practical place to locate the country's first rental Tesla. Thrifty's parent company, NRMA, is calling on Australia's other states and territories to remove financial and regulatory barriers to EV technology. Read more at The Motor Report.

Race Recap: 2013 Bahrain Grand Prix follows the template of this year and last [spoilers]

The sand, the wind, the penalties, the contact and the one crash - all of them collided to make the Bahrain Formula One Grand Prix a surprise affair from day to day and lap to lap. Oh, and did we mention the tires? Pirelli made a last-minute swap after the amusement park ride that the Chinese Grand Prix turned into with the soft compound tire, and brought medium and hard compounds to the desert. That didn't stop things from falling apart for some teams - literally - and that didn't stop the one team that seems to love the hard compound Pirelli tire.

Infiniti Q30 will debut at Frankfurt Motor Show

The Infiniti Q30 made its debut as a svelte concept at the 2013 Frankfurt Motor Show. Now, two years later, the luxury hatchback will make a big return to the German show in September to launch in production guise. Before the end of the year, the first Q30s will start showing up for sale in European showrooms to take on rivals like the Audi A3. To tease the launch, Infiniti has released this single image of the Q30 going through final validation testing on the road. Unfortunately, it's still wearing a very effective camouflage pattern – just like some previously spied examples. Still, we can tell that there are definite similarities to the hatchback's stylish QX30 compact crossover sibling, which is also on the way. Both of them have sharply pointed, narrow headlights and steeply raked hatches. We can also just make out the deeply creased swage line that cuts through the front door handles and then dips down in this photo. Infiniti promises more details to come about the Q30 before the Frankfurt launch. At least for European examples, assembly is reportedly earmarked for the Sunderland factory in the UK. Related Video: Infiniti Q30 to debut at Frankfurt IAA 2015 All-new Q30 compact entry to debut 90 days from today to the public Infiniti's first-ever compact car currently going through validation and dynamic tuning in Europe Sales to begin in Europe before end of 2015 HONG KONG – Infiniti will unveil its first-ever compact car at the International Motor Show in Frankfurt in September this year (September 17 to 27). Two years after the Infiniti Q30 Concept debuted at the 2013 Frankfurt show, the production version of this segment-spanning compact car will be revealed at the show this year. Infiniti is in the final stages of preparing the launch. Dynamic testing and ultimate validation is currently taking place across the UK and throughout mainland Europe where development of the vehicle has been completed at the company's Engineering Center in Cranfield, UK, since 2014. The Q30 will go on sale in Europe towards the end of 2015 with other markets to follow subsequently. More news on the Infiniti Q30 active compact will be released closer to the Frankfurt show in September. About Infiniti Infiniti Motor Company Ltd. is headquartered in Hong Kong with sales operations in over 50 countries. The Infiniti brand was launched in 1989. Its range of premium automobiles is currently built in manufacturing facilities in Japan, the United States and China.