Fast-expanding Marshall Motor Group is to represent Hyundai in Cambridge.The company has been on the acquisition trail since the beginning of the year.
Last month Marshall took on the Kia franchise in Ipswich and bought Ipswich Jaguar from Lookers. The company already represented Jaguar in Cambridge and Peterborough and the addition of Ipswich gave the group the largest contiguous territory for Jaguar in the UK.
De Vries purchase
In February Marshall bought three DeVries Honda dealerships.
Commenting on the Hyundai move, chief executive, Daksh Gupta said:
"As part of our stated plan to grow our business nationally, we are keen to expand our portfolio of franchises.
Great service
"We continue to evaluate many interesting and scalable opportunities where our values and approach to the business will deliver great service to our customers and reward our shareholders and brand partners in the process."
Tony Whitehorn, managing director of Hyundai in the UK, said: "We are delighted to be partnering with Marshalls in Cambridge whose number one focus is the same as ours - customer satisfaction. The people of Cambridge are 'in for a real treat' with the Marshalls and Hyundai partnership."
DATED: 03.07.09
FEED: MT
# posted by Profit Training Ltd : 8:59 pm
Glass's Information Services has appointed Andy Carroll as managing director.Carroll joins the company on 1 August having worked in the automotive sector for 20 years.
Senior roles
He held senior sales and marketing positions at GM Europe, including sales director for commercial vehicles and chief operating officer of internet car retailer OneSwoop.
He was managing director of GM Daewoo UK and subsequently managing director of Chevrolet UK. More recently Carroll was head of international sales & marketing at GAZ Group.
Carroll joins Glass's from a large dealer group, where he has been working as a board adviser. He has a Masters Degree in Manufacturing Engineering from Trinity Hall, Cambridge and an MBA.
"Glass's is a tremendous brand that is rightly proud of over 75 years of innovation and insight," said Carroll.
Tumultuous times
EurotaxGlass's International group chief executive officer Alastair MacLeod said: "The past 12 months have been tumultuous ones for all of Glass's customers.
"The business landscape has changed forever, and I am looking forward to engaging with those customers and to further develop Glass's relevance, excellence and value."
DATED: 03.07.09
FEED: MT
# posted by Profit Training Ltd : 8:58 pm
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Marshall Motor Group has acquired Ipswich Jaguar from Lookers. Marshall already represents Jaguar in Cambridge and Peterborough and the addition of Ipswich gives the group the largest contiguous territory for Jaguar in the UK. The Ipswich Jaguar business will continue to operate from its existing site in the town centre and all of the former Lookers staff have transferred to Marshall. National ambtions
"This is the fifth new business that we have added this year and is in line with our stated intention to expand our group nationally, deliberately moving beyond our historical boundaries with scalable businesses which offer us further opportunity for growth," said chief executive, Daksh Gupta. "We have represented Jaguar for over 35 years and have an excellent relationship with them. We are very grateful to Jaguar for their support in this acquisition. With Ipswich, we now cover the whole of Suffolk and Cambridgeshire with the nearest non-Marshall Jaguar dealerships over 40 miles away," he said. Jaguar partnership
Geoff Cousins, managing director of Jaguar UK said: "The Jaguar brand is increasingly being recognised for its obsessive attention to delivering the highest quality product and exceptional customer service. This extends to our dealer partners and I am delighted that Marshalls have increased its partnership with Jaguar." Marshall is already established in Ipswich having added the Kia franchise to its Vauxhall and Chevrolet businesses at Ransome Europark earlier this month. DATED: 03.07.09
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# posted by Profit Training Ltd : 8:55 pm
A flagship UK Government scheme to help the car industry survive the recession has yet to pay out a single penny, despite the threat of job losses at Jaguar, Land Rover and Vauxhall.
The £2.3 billion Automotive Assistance Programme (AAP) was launched in a blaze of publicity on March 11, when ministers predicted it would aid more than 100 carmakers and suppliers. The Government said at the time the scheme would provide 'real help now'.
Yet three months on, the AAP has yet to pay out a penny. MPs on the House of Commons Business Committee were told earlier this month that just four applications were 'close to approval', with no predicted date for the first payment.
Asked about the loans made, Ian Gregory, director of the automotive sector at the Department for Business, Industry and Skills, said: "It's a round number - it's none. I can't pretend to be anything other than disappointed."
Insiders blamed the lack of payouts on Government bureaucracy. The committee heard that similar schemes in France and Germany had been paying out for some time.
The AAP, the brainchild of Business Secretary Lord Mandelson, was designed to use £2.3bn of Government loans and guarantees to unlock £1.3bn in loans from the European Investment Bank for investment in 'greener' vehicles.
One of the four applications has been made by Jaguar, which employs 14,500 in the West Midlands and Merseyside. The union Unite told MPs Jaguar remained in 'serious financial difficulty' because of the Government's failure to act.
DATED: 30.06.09
FEED: AW
# posted by Profit Training Ltd : 7:39 pm
Volkswagen has delivered Porsche an ultimatum to accept a tie-up between the two carmakers in a deal that would be backed by the Qatar Investment Authority.
Porsche hit out at its rival after Volkswagen issued a deadline of yesterday (Monday, June 29) for the luxury carmaker to agree to a merger plan. Volkswagen subsequently denied that an ultimatum had been issued, although reports suggested that the company was pushing for a tie-up by the end of June.
Wolfgang Porsche, head of Porsche's supervisory board, called the ultimatum from Volkswagen and its key shareholder, the German state of Lower Saxony, 'damaging'.
He added: "Ultimatums do not belong in the 21st century. We won't be blackmailed."
The proposed tie-up would lead to a complicated system of cross-ownership between the two groups and their main shareholders.
Porsche currently holds a 51 per cent stake in Volkswagen while Porsche is controlled by the Porsche and Piech families.
Under the proposed terms, Volkswagen would take a 49.9 per cent stake in Porsche.
The merged company would be 40 per cent owned by the Porsche and Piech families, with Lower Saxony taking 20 per cent, the Gulf state of Qatar 15 per cent via its Qatar Investment Authority investment vehicle, with a unnamed sovereign wealth fund taking a further 5 per cent.
While Volkswagen is pushing for the deal, Porsche remains in talks with the Qatar Investment Authority and could still look to agree a deal exclusively with the sovereign wealth fund to get itself out of financial difficulties. The manufacturer has debts of €9 billion.
DATED: 30.06.09
FEED: AW
# posted by Profit Training Ltd : 7:39 pm
The official report into the collapse of MG Rover four years ago has been delivered to the Government.
The inquiry was established soon after the collapse of Britain's last independently-owned major car company in 2005 amid widespread outrage over the way the company's owner, dubbed the 'Phoenix Four', had netted tens of millions of pounds for themselves.
Officials and ministers at the Department for Business are now deciding when to publish the report. No formal date has yet been set. The total cost of the inquiry was £15.9 million.
The 'Phoenix Four', businessmen John Towers, Peter Beale, John Edwards and Nick Stephenson were vilified for their role in the collapse of MG Rover, which was owned by a company called Phoenix Venture Holdings, with the loss of 6,000 jobs.
DATED: 30.06.09
FEED: AW
# posted by Profit Training Ltd : 7:38 pm
US carmaker General Motors has agreed to accept liability for future product claims, paving the way for the firm's emergence from Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
Eight state attorneys general and consumer groups had opposed part of GM's bankruptcy plan to free it from future liability for vehicle defects.
The firm now says it will "assume all products liability claims" regardless of when the product was purchased.
The firm faces a hearing on 30 June over its restructuring plan.
Under the reorganisation plan, the government would hold 60.8% of a "New GM", with 17.5% owned by the United Auto Workers Trust and 11.7% owned by Canada's government.
Documents submitted to a bankruptcy court filed before the weekend showed the firm had accepted responsibility for future claims.
GM had previously said it would not assume responsibility for future claims by consumers against the firm - regarding "accidents or other discrete incidents arising from the operation of GM vehicles".
But there had been concerns that this could leave huge numbers of consumers with limited legal rights, because they would be seeking compensation from a firm with largely unprofitable assets.
"The fact that 'New GM' will protect consumers injured by defective 'Old GM' cars is a positive development for public safety," The Ad Hoc Committee of Consumer Victims of Chrysler and GM said in a statement.
Under the restructuring plan, the new GM will not however take on liability for pending claims against the firm.
Those claimants will have to seek compensation from the old firm.
DATED: 30.06.09
FEED: AW
# posted by Profit Training Ltd : 7:37 pm
Car dealership group Lookers is to raise £80.7 million in a fully underwritten share sale to reduce its debts and change its banking arrangements on to more favourable terms.
The announcement, which coincided with the company's annual general meeting, will see 201.85 million new shares issued at 40p each, a 19% discount on last Thursday's (June 25) closing price.
Chairman Phil White said: "Lookers has established a solid basis for protecting profitability in the current difficult trading environment and is trading relatively resiliently. The group's balance sheet will be strengthened significantly as a result of the offer. The improved capital structure will provide significant flexibility to enable the group to pursue its development strategy and capitalise on opportunities as the market recovers."
The company will use the cash raised to repay a £50m high interest loan, reduce a term loan by £15m and reduce a revolving credit facility by £11.5m.
The Lookers board recently agreed with its lending banks the accessing of up to £210m in loans until April 2012.
Commenting on the current crisis facing the UK motor industry, Lookers said: "The global economic downturn, uncertainties in financial markets and rising unemployment have affected UK consumer confidence. A reduction in consumer credit to finance car purchases has compounded this drop in consumer confidence."
Nevertheless, the company believes that the current Government and motor industry scrappage scheme designed to boost new car and van sales should improve registrations and thereby help strengthen the company's retail sales.
Lookers says that its like-for-like new car sales for the first five months of 2009 are 10% ahead of the market and the motor division's performance in the period was ahead of budget, despite market pressures affecting sales of new cars.
Describing the current new car market as 'extremely challenging', Lookers said that although its increasing sales would gain market share the decline in volume had reduced profits compared to the same period in 2008. Lookers says that its used car sales and aftersales business continue to grow.
In a statement, the company said: "The board believes that fragile consumer confidence will mean that 2009 will be challenging for the new car market. However, the impact of the UK scrappage scheme should ultimately benefit new car sales, and the board is endeavouring to optimise the opportunity that this presents to maximise sales.
"The board believes that the Group is well placed to take advantage of opportunities which may arise and emerge from the current downturn as a stronger and more efficient business."
At the AGM, it was announced that chief executive Ken Surgenor, who will be 65 in August, will stand down from the board on September 30. Peter Jones, currently managing director of the motor division, will takeover as chief executive on October 1. However, Mr Surgenor will remain with the group running the Charles Hurst group of businesses in Northern Ireland.
DATED: 30.06.09
FEED: AW
# posted by Profit Training Ltd : 7:36 pm
Peugeot plans to cut its 266-strong network, with around 26 dealers being given notice of termination.
Rod Philpott, director of network development, said Peugeot was looking to have 250 UK sites and with new dealerships and terminations, it would balance out to around that number.
He added that it was impossible to pinpoint why dealers have been terminated.
"It could be they didn't sell enough cars, or they weren't good with customers or property issues. It's not fair to generalise," commented Mr Philpott.
DATED: 30.06.09
FEED: AW
# posted by Profit Training Ltd : 7:35 pm
