In his recent interview on 60 Minutes, Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne mentioned only two future products: a new Maserati SUV (the China-oriented Kubang) that will be built in Detroit, and the upcoming Dodge Dart compact sedan, which is beginning to roll off a Chrysler assembly line in Belvedere, Ill. One of his main points to CBS correspondent Steve Kroft was that Dart will be "mechanically" sound.

Chrysler needs that to be the case. Amid all of the success and progress that the company has enjoyed since getting up off the mat in 2009 — big sales gains, positive Super Bowl buzz for its Clint Eastwood "Halftime in America" commercial, a raft of generally well received new products (including a key green car nod for the Chrysler 300) — the one bugaboo that the company hasn't been able to get past is its reputation for poor quality.

Even though it has improved markedly over the last several years, and under a succession of regimes, the company simply hasn't been able to keep pace with rising quality levels across the rest of the industry. Now, Chrysler executives are determined to banish the quality bogeyman once and for all.Continue reading...

Ford may still be awaiting better overall credit ratings so it can formally re-take control of its iconic Blue Oval logo. In the meantime, the company is farming out the famous marque to more and more licensees who want to get in on the growing renaissance at America's first surviving car company. For the first time at auto shows this year, Ford has been setting up its own boutique on show floors to sell such Ford-branded merchandise to consumers.

"We've got a whole group merchandising non-autos licensing now," Jim Farley, Ford's global CMO, commented on Monday at a press event discussing the automaker's global "Go Further" campaign.  Consumer and licensee interest in leveraging the brand in this way "is one of the best measures of brand health," he added.

Licensing deals to date, Farley said, include a Mustang-themed pool table (above) and a variety of toys. Ford, naturally, insists on approving actual products and their execution of Ford marks, not just concepts and proposals, so there's an area at corporate HQ set aside for housing and evaluation of all the proposed items. "It's a fun place to go," Farley said.

Ford may be trying to keep its brand name and logo on the downlow in its "Go Further" TV campaign, but it's hard to hide the enthusiasm around company headquarters in Dearborn, Mich., these days as the U.S. auto recovery picks up speed — and so does Ford.

That may be why CEO Alan Mulally was ebullient at Ford's annual general meeting in Wilmington, Del., on Thursday. "We are no longer turning around," Mulally told shareholders. "We are moving ahead."

The company hasn't yet gotten its iconic Blue Oval out of hock, but additional ratings-agency bumps of Ford bonds are expected to move that moment closer, as Ford seeks to regain control of one of the major assets it pledged as collateral in its private-borrowing spree before the Great Recession.Continue reading...

Toyota is going down the electric-vehicle trail once again, but it's not getting too charged up about it.

The automaker revealed an EV version of its popular RAV4 SUV this week at the Electric Vehicle Symposium in Los Angeles. But unlike rivals Nissan and Chevrolet, who have backed their EVs with major marketing splurges and ambitions of quickly reaching 10,000 sales a year, Toyota is deliberately reining in both output and sales expectations for the RAV4 EV, which is expected to be available in the third quarter.Continue reading...

Toyota's robust financial report today sends a message to all rivals, foreign and domestic, that the company intends to compete vigorously once again for worldwide dominance.

The company now expects its profit for the current fiscal year, which ends in March, to more than double to 760 billion yen, boosted by new models and growth particularly in the U.S. market.

Toyota's reasons for optimism include strong reception for its new 2013 Camry, launched last fall, as well as robust demand for its Prius family of hybrids, which include versions smaller and larger than the original that have been launched recently. Prius models now outsell every other Toyota nameplate but Camry, including the previous No. 2 model, the Corolla compact.Continue reading...

Scion as a brand is going back to the future. Back, that is, to the time when there was no Scion brand — back to more conventional vehicles and marketing than the iconoclastic touch that led to the origination of Toyota's "youth" brand in 2004.

When Toyota announced Scion brand sales for April, executives hoped to continue a trend begun in the first quarter, when Scion sales were up by 19 percent over a year earlier. After four bad years, Scion sales actually ticked up by 8 percent last year over 2010.

In fact, according to Toyota's April U.S. sales press release, Scion posted April sales of 5,503 units, up 8.4 percent versus April 2011. The tC sports coupe led the way with sales of 2,008 units, and the xB urban utility vehicle recorded April sales of 1,617 units. The all-new iQ premium micro-subcompact — the world's smallest four-seater — posted monthly sales of 962 units, followed by the xD five-door urban subcompact with 916 units.

Ironically, the reason Scion is on the cusp of a brand resurgence is that Toyota has scrapped the original reason for the brand.Continue reading...

If you’re a Ford dealer, it’ll take more than that for you to be able to sell Focus Electric when the all-electric version of Ford’s popular compact car comes to market later this year.

Your dealership’s credentials are going to have to be green like the car itself.

So far, Ford said, 67 dealers are certified and ready to sell Focus Electric, in California, New York and New Jersey – markets that account for a huge portion of electrified-vehicle sales.Continue reading...

It's fitting that Honda's Facebook page is touting brand enthusiasts' stories, because the automaker is in the middle of its own comeback story. Yes, it finally seems good to be Honda again.

The brand posted April U.S. sales of 122,000 vehicles today, which was down by about 2 percent from a year ago in absolute-unit numbers. But on a "selling-day" average for the month, Honda sales were up 9 percent over a year ago.

Honda U.S. is now fully restocked with vehicles after last year's disasters, and many of its most important models are moving briskly again off of U.S. dealership floors. Even its long-suffering Acura luxury brand showed some spark during the month, with a 5-percent sales increase over last April.Continue reading...