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A realistic approach to fixing Mitsubishi

There are going to be a lot of words written about what Nissan needs to do with Mitsubishi in the coming months and years in the interest of turning the brand around. After Nissan's purchase of a controlling stake in the diamond star brand, there's been more interest in Mitsubishi thanks to the potential of platform sharing and plenty of cash from Nissan-Renault to get the juices flowing again. But, while some have been doing their best to advocate for the return of the 3000GT, Evolution, and even the Starion - Many of these posts forget the reality of the market we live in today. As much as we like to look back fondly at the sports coupes of the '90s, a byproduct of the insane cash flows all the Japanese manufacturers had at the time, the reality of today puts a much greater emphasis on what is most-boring; Crossover SUVs, alongside mid-size and compact sedans. We do need to ask a fundamental question, how much Mitsubishi is enough to be able to continue to call the cars Mitsubishis? Aside from slight product revisions and reconfigurations, Mitsubishi (at least in North America) has been largely dependent on the same GS platform and 4B1 engines that date back to their long-time partnership with Chrysler (and Hyundai) in the mid '00s. Admittedly, the chassis and engines have served the company well, underpinning a wide variety of vehicles sold around the world, and seeing quite a few revisions to at least attempt to keep products competitive. But, the GS chassis is old, heavy, and severely out of date - and when matched to the underpowered 4B1 series engines - make for largely uncompetitive offerings in the market. While something like the Outlander Sport is indeed interesting compared to a Honda CR-V, it is by no means the smart choice in the segment. So, going forward, unless Mitsubishi has had a skunkworks of sorts developing their chassis and engine replacements over the past few years, what exactly are they planning to do for their bread-and-butter models? I think the straightforward answer is without a doubt the Nissan North America parts bin. With so many of their models selling well, and for the most part, are reasonably well-reviewed, it would be quite simple to adapt the chassis and powertrain to Mitsubishi's liking to create a high-volume alternative to what is currently available now.

nuTonomy beats Uber to launch first self-driving taxi

In the cutthroat world of technology, if you're not first, you're last. With this in mind, it shouldn't come as a surprise to see tech companies and automakers clawing to be first in line to release self-driving cars. Uber recently partnered with Volvo in a $300-million project that should result in a self-driving fleet as early as next month. But amazingly, a 3-year-old company called nuTonomy has beat Uber to the punch by launching the world's first self-driving taxi in Singapore. Cambridge, MA,-based nuTonomy has been privately testing self-driving vehicles in Singapore since April and is now allowing select residents in the city's one-north business district to be driven around in its self-driving taxis for free. Customers will be able to summon one of nuTonomy's self-driving taxis through the company's app and will be picked up in a Renault Zoe or Mitsubishi i-MiEV electric car modified for autonomous driving. While the taxi will drive itself, an engineer from nuTonomy will ride in the vehicle to ensure that the car is operating properly and will take over if needed. There's no word on how many self-driving taxis nuTonomy put on the road, but the trials take the company one step closer to launching its fully autonomous fleet by 2018. The Wall Street Journal's Jake Watts managed to get a ride in one of nuTonomy's self-driving taxis and, while it went well, he claims human cabdrivers may not go extinct any time soon. According to Watts, the self-driving Mitsubishi lacked Tesla's polish and was overly cautious. The car did a fine job of avoiding jaywalkers, parked cars, and pedestrians on the short drive, but hesitated often, which could gives riders motion sickness, Watts said. nuTonomy CEO Karl Iagnemma will be speaking at Autoblog's UPSHIFT 2016 conference on transportation technology on October 6 in Detroit. Related Video: News Source: The Wall Street Journal, nuTonomyImage Credit: nuTonomy Green Mitsubishi Renault Technology Emerging Technologies Autonomous Vehicles Electric Uber driverless singapore nutonomy

NHTSA begins inquiry into Mitsubishi fuel economy

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration wants to make sure Mitsubishi doesn't falsify fuel economy ratings in the US like the company does in Japan. "We've requested information from Mitsubishi about this issue," a NHTSA spokesperson told Reuters. The person didn't provide details about the specific models the regulator wanted to know more about. At this time, there's no evidence of fuel economy inaccuracies for any North American models. The affected vehicles in Japan so far are 625,000 small kei-class cars, including the Mitsubishi eK, eK Space, Nissan Dayz, and Dayz Roox, which Mitsu produces for Nissan. However, Japanese regulators are taking a closer look at other models and gave the company a week to hand over test data. A newspaper there claims Mitsubishi allegedly used "non-Japanese test methodology" on the RVR, Outlander, Pajero, and Minicab MiEV. NHTSA's look into Mitsubishi comes at the same time the Department of Justice is scrutinizing Daimler for possible emissions anomalies. "Daimler will consequently investigate possible indications of irregularities and of course take all necessary action," the German automaker said in a statement. The company asserts the DOJ's inquiry is unrelated to a lawsuit from owners, which alleges the BlueTec emissions control system is designed to turn off at low temperatures. Related Video: