2010 Volvo S40 T5 R-design Sedan 4-door 2.5l on 2040-cars

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Car subscription services: A slow, expensive start — but the potential is huge

Americans are used to paying for subscriptions — to magazines and cable television, for instance — but experience shows they'll cancel when the price of admission gets too high, or there are more tempting alternatives. Cord cutters ditched nearly 1.5 million pay-TV subscriptions in 2017, according to a survey by Leichtman Research Group. Cable TV started out cheap with basic offerings, and then got expensive. The auto industry's subscription offerings are new, but they're starting out costly, and not price-competitive with traditional leasing. The upside is that they take the hassle out of car ownership for busy people by letting the service take care of maintenance, insurance, licensing and taxes. And they give consumers choice, often allowing relatively painless switches between different cars in the automakers' lineup. Subscription services also point the way toward an ownership-free auto experience, and offer an easy transition to a potential world where ride- and car-sharing will be dominant. Subscriptions are here to stay, but consumers may take a while to "get" them. Lincoln's subscription service for lightly used 2015 to 2017 models, offered through the Ford-owned Canvas beginning this year, got off to a slow start. Many early subscribers canceled. Last month, Cadillac announced it would " temporarily pause" its $1,800-per-month Book subscription service for "adjustments" as of December 1. According to the Wall Street Journal, "Snags with the back-end technology used to support the service made some customer-service functions tedious and time-consuming, adding costs for the company." The challenge for automakers is to come up with a strategy that offers consumers a compelling, affordable option to regular ownership, and one that can also make a profit. I think they'll find that sweet spot, but they're not there yet. Jack Nerad, former executive editorial director at Kelley Blue Book and author of " The Complete Idiot's Guide to Buying or Leasing a Car," points out that "A lot of people expected that subscriptions would be very valuable for people who wanted inexpensive transportation, but the reality is quite the opposite. Subscriptions are offering more choices for the wealthy.

Volvo planning Golf rival, 'breathtaking' C60 coupe

Despite just having refreshed nearly its entire portfolio, Volvo is still in the middle of a big product offensive. Vehicles like the C30 hatchback and C70 convertible have been given the axe, but a brand-new platform is being developed in addition to the Scalable Platform Architecture (SPA) that will underpin larger vehicles. According to Automobile, this means some very interesting newcomers may be on tap for the brand.
Volvo, in collaboration with Geely, is said to be working on a new platform about the size of a Volkswagen Golf that will likely spawn both a sedan and hatchback. Automobile reports that while the automaker's new scalable architecture is quite flexible, it cannot be stretched (or rather, shrunk) to accommodate a smaller vehicle.
Instead, SPA will be used for the company's larger offerings, starting with the V40 on the small end. (Though to our eyes, the current V40 looks plenty Golf-sized to us.) A new XC40 is apparently in the works, as is an S90 flagship, and new versions of the XC60, XC90 and S60 will all be coming based on this new flexible architecture.

Volvo Cars to leave ACEA car lobby group over climate goals

LONDON — Volvo Cars said on Friday it will leave the European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) by the end of 2022, citing differences between its zero-emission strategy and that of Europe's car lobby group. The Swedish carmaker has committed to having a fully-electric car range by 2030, well ahead of the European Union's proposal for an effective ban on fossil-fuel cars as of 2035. Volvo has been a proponent of moving more swiftly to zero-emission transport, but after the EU parliament voted in June in favour of the 2035 deadline the ACEA said that "any long-term regulation going beyond this decade is premature at this early stage." In a statement Volvo said "we have concluded that Volvo Cars' sustainability strategy and ambitions are not fully aligned with ACEAÂ’s positioning and way of working at this stage." "We therefore believe it is better to take a different path for now," the carmaker added. "What we do as a sector will play a major role in deciding whether the world has a fighting chance to curb climate change." The news comes less than a month after world No. 4 carmaker Stellantis said it would leave the ACEA by the end of 2022 as part of a new approach to addressing issues and challenges of future mobility, including a shift away from traditional lobbying activity. The European Automobile Manufacturers Association, widely known by its French acronym ACEA, has been the industry's main lobbying group since its creation in 1991, uniting Europe's 16 major car, truck, van and bus makers.   Government/Legal Green Volvo Emissions Green Automakers Electric