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Autocar compares new Maserati Quattroporte to Jaguar XJ

Autocar's Steve Sutcliffe took the 2014 Maserati Quattroporte on a spin along snowy mountain roads to test it for a specific brief: as a limousine for the chauffeured class. It's sporting credentials are impressive: Twin-turbocharged 3.8-liter V8, 532 horsepower, 475 pound-feet of torque in casual circumstances that rises to 532 lb-ft in overboost, a 0-to-60 mile-per-hour sprint of 4.7 seconds and a top speed of 191 mph.
However, citing Maserati's desire to not just increase its sales to 50,000-per-annum by 2015, but to sell many more of its cars in China, Sutcliffe wanted to find out if the livery side of the Quattroporte could match its sport sedan side. So after taking the pilot's seat and trying out the sport settings, Sutcliffe hops in back to test out the CEO's seat.
Then he compares the Quattroporte against the long-wheelbase Jaguar XJ with its supercharged V8, a sedan that's 15,000 pounds less expensive than the Maserati. It doesn't take long for him to find that one of them is a clear winner when it comes to transporting VIPs. To find out which one, enjoy the video below.

Maserati Levante SUV may be built in Italy after all

In July Fiat halted its investments in Italy, putting on hold plans for the Maserati Levante SUV to be built at the automaker's flagship factory in Turin. But Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne, whose company owns Maserati, met with unions on Wednesday, and he may announce plans to move forward with production of the SUV at the Mirafiori factory if the CEO and the unions reach an agreement, Bloomberg reports.
Marchionne is reportedly about ready to build new cars at Fiat's largest and oldest factory, on the grounds that 5,300 workers accept extended temporary layoffs through most of next year in a slowing European auto market. If unions don't accept the deal, it's not clear whether Fiat would still consider building the Levante at Mirafiori or not.
The Levante, Maserati's first SUV, is based on the Jeep Grand Cherokee platform, and we reported two years ago that it would be built in Detroit next to its Jeep cousin. Obviously those plans have been altered considerably in the intervening period of time.

Ferrari to stop supplying Maserati with its engines

The Ferrari Q1 earnings call was full of information, and perhaps the biggest revelation was that Ferrari is going to stop supplying engines to Maserati. CEO Louis Camilleri broke the news, and The Motley Fool posted a transcript of the whole call online. "Eventually, we will no longer supply engines to Maserati, which actually from our perspective is actually a good thing, both from a margin perspective, but also the fact that we can transfer a lot of the labor that's been focused on the engines to the car side of the business," Camilleri says. Maserati has used Ferrari engines (arguably, one of the most compelling reasons to buy a Maserati) in its vehicles since 2002, a little while after Fiat passed Maserati off to the prancing horse. The partnership continued as both Ferrari and Maserati were under the same house at FCA. Then when Ferrari was spun off from FCA in 2015, they kept the supply steady to Maserati. Those engines include a 3.8-liter twin-turbo V8, 3.0-liter twin-turbo V6 and a 4.7-liter naturally aspirated V8. Camilleri said Ferrari will officially stop in 2021 or 2022, with no intention of supplying anybody with engines beyond that. Of course, this leaves Maserati high and dry with no engines for its growing lineup. Maserati will have to reach into the FCA parts bin, find a new outside supplier or develop its own engines. Battery electric sounds out of the question. As of now, there doesn't appear to be a clear plan going forward. We've reached out to Maserati to see if they have any comment on the situation as it stands.