2023 Mclaren Gt on 2040-cars

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VW CEO Winterkorn happy with rebounding Seat, Skoda

Martin Winterkorn is a happy man: Volkswagen is putting up big numbers in North America, its latest field of dreams, Audi, is breaking records every month, there are exciting cars in the pipeline - from Bugatti down to the XL1, Porsche's digestion continues, and now Skoda and especially Seat are turning in no-questions performance.
It seems Skoda has been on the ups for years, making the most of keen pricing and modern redesigns of the chassis and tech it gets handed down from big brothers VW and Audi. Winterkorn predicts the Czech brand will just about double its 2010 sales by 2018, going from 762,000 to 1.5 million.
Seat, on the other hand, wasn't just on the hotseat a year-and-a-half ago, phrases like "uncertain future" - code for "possible demise" - were rumbling in the background. A new CEO was brought in, new money and new models were thrown against the wall, and the efforts have stuck. The Spanish brand has hit three strong chords with Winterkorn, with increased sales, strong performance in China and anticipated models due. If this keeps up there won't be much left for him to do but, a la Alexander the Great, break down and cry with no worlds left to conquer.

McLaren weighing dedicated P1 Track version

Start drawing parallels between Ferrari and McLaren and you're not likely to be left with much white space on the page when you're done. Both are Formula One racing teams first and foremost, and only started building cars for the road once they'd proven themselves on the racetrack. They both top the leaderboards for the most F1 championships, and have probably swapped more drivers (not to mention sponsors) than any other teams on the grid, but have both fallen behind in recent years and fired their team principals as a result. Their road-going supercars compete for largely the same customers, from the ~$250k, mid-engined V8s of the 458 and 650S all the way up to the latest million-dollar, 900-plus-horsepower hybrid hypercars. But Ferrari is a bigger company and has been in the game much longer, and as a result offers its customers two things that McLaren does not. One is front-engined GTs like the F12 Berlinetta, FF and California. The other is the exclusive XX track program. While McLaren may be showing no intention of taking on the former, the latter could be in the cards. In correspondence with Autoblog, McLaren spokesman Wayne Bruce confirmed a report from Autocar stating that, following requests from a number of P1 owners, the company has contacted all 375 buyers to gauge interest in a dedicated track-only version of the P1. Similar to the Ferrari FXX or the upcoming LaFerrari XX, the P1 Track would be set up specifically for the circuit. According to Bruce, "the P1 'Track' will have (even) more power and (even) torque than the road legal P1. It will also have (even) more extreme, aero tuned styling and an (even) more minimalist interior." All of which sounds pretty promising, considering the starting point is a hybrid hypercar with 903 horsepower and 664 pound-feet of torque on tap. But that's not all: "McLaren will organise a series of track events dedicated to the P1 'Track' and its owners. There will be one-to-one driver training for this very exclusive group, too." In other words, a similar approach to what Ferrari takes with its top clients, only likely without the pretense of paying to serve as a factory test driver. Production of the P1 Track would only start once all 375 road-going versions were completed, and though "the number to be produced has not been established yet... we envisage it being in the low double digits," with application open exclusively to existing P1 owners.

UK car output falls 14% in March, may get worse with no-deal Brexit

LONDON — British car output fell for the 10th month in a row in March, hit by a slowdown in key foreign markets, and the sector stands to suffer a lot more if the country leaves the European Union without a deal, an industry body said on Tuesday. Output tumbled by an annual 14.4 percent to 126,195 cars in March, the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders said. Exports, which account for nearly four out of every five cars made in Britain, were down by 13.4 percent. The SMMT said analysis it had commissioned predicted output would fall this year to 1.36 million units from 1.52 million in 2018, assuming London can secure a transition deal with the EU. If Britain has to rely instead on World Trade Organization rules for its trade with the bloc, which include import tariffs, output is forecast to fall by around 30 percent to 1.07 million units in 2021, returning to mid-1980s levels, the SMMT said. The forecasts were produced for SMMT by AutoAnalysis, a consultancy. Prime Minister Theresa May has secured a delay to the Brexit deadline until Oct. 31, giving her more time to try to break an impasse in parliament over the terms of Britain's departure from the EU. Foreign minister Jeremy Hunt traveled to Japan earlier this month to try to persuade the Japanese government and Toyota, which has a big presence in Britain, that London was determined to avoid a no-deal Brexit. "Just a few years ago, industry was on track to produce 2 million cars by 2020 — a target now impossible with Britain's reputation as stable and attractive business environment undermined," SMMT chief executive Mike Hawes said. "All parties must find a compromise urgently so we can set about repairing the damage and diverting energy and investment to the technological challenges that will define the future of the global industry." (Reporting by William Schomberg, editing by David Milliken)