1985 Mercedes-benz 300cd Base Coupe 2-door 3.0l on 2040-cars

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Maybach lost upwards of $500k on each vehicle sold

Daimler is shuttering Maybach in 2013 after seven years of production. In that time, the company's ultra-ultra-luxury arm managed to sell just 3,000 units, and CAR reports Daimler lost somewhere around $500,000 on each and every one of them.
Even with a ludicrous price tag of over $370,000 for an "entry" Maybach 57, the brand couldn't quite recoup the dizzying $1.33 billion Daimler poured into it since its (re)inception. Rumors ignited over a possible tie up with Aston Martin that would have resulted in a range of new and attractive models, but Daimler has instead decided to snuff out Maybach altogether.
We can hardly blame them.

Mercedes C-Class Coupe due to go on sale next December

While we expect to see the coming Mercedes C-Class convertible sometime next year, perhaps at the Paris Motor Show, Auto Motor und Sport reports that the C-Class Coupe will go on sale in December 2015 (probably in Europe first) - it's possible we'll see it debuted at the same time as the cabrio. The German magazine says the two-door will have sharper lines on a body that is four inches longer, almost two inches wider and a fraction of an inch lower than the sedan, dimensional aggrandizement that will be put to good effect on the AMG version coming in 2016. We'll have to wait for information on powertrains, which should hew to the sedan's lineup in addition to whatever else M-B might bring over here, topped off by the 503-horsepower, twin-turbo V8 in the AMG variant. Speaking of which, the 'last-generation' C63 AMG Coupe is still on sale until spring of next year, if you're a fan of the classics. Or you can wait on news of the C-Class four-door coupe, if niches inside of niches are what you're really after.

Weekly Recap: Mercedes, Volkswagen spend big as import automakers invest in North America

Import automakers are on a building frenzy in North America as resurgent car sales have prompted companies to expand their manufacturing footprints to meet rising demand. That was evidenced this week when Mercedes-Benz announced plans to build a $500-million factory to produce the Sprinter commercial van, and Volkswagen confirmed a whopping $1-billion investment to expand its massive plant in Mexico. Meanwhile Jaguar Land Rover reportedly wants to build a factory in North America, but not for at least three years, and Hyundai is said to be expanding in the southern United States. The common thread in all of this expansion? Trucks, time and money. Mercedes wants to capitalize on the burgeoning work van segment in the United States and will break ground in 2016 on a 200-acre site in Charleston, SC, to build the next-generation Sprinter. The site will have a paint shop, body shop and an assembly line, and 1,300 people will be employed when production ramps up. Why do this, when Mercedes has immense van operations in Germany? It's cheaper to build in the US for the US market. Building locally allows Mercedes to avoid import taxes, forego a complex shipping process that involves partially disassembling German-built Sprinters and naturally, reduces the time it takes to deliver finished trucks to their buyers. "This plant is key to our future growth in the very dynamic North American van market," Volker Mornhinweg, head of Mercedes-Benz Vans, said in a statement. He was speaking about Mercedes and vans, but another German automotive giant, Volkswagen, had similar motives for its mammoth expansion plans in Puebla, Mexico. The added space and production capacity will allow VW to build a three-row version of the Tiguan, and provide another crossover for its US lineup that's light on SUVs. The current Tiguan has two rows. The factory will be able to churn out 500 units daily of the larger variant, and they will be sold in North and South America. It will arrive in the US in mid-2017, a spokesman told Autoblog. VW also plans to build another crossover, a midsize seven-passenger vehicle, at its growing Chattanooga, TN, site. "Localization has become key to safeguarding our competitive position on the global market, and manufacturing the Tiguan in Mexico will bring production closer to the US market," Michael Horn, CEO of Volkswagen Group of America, said in a statement.