mika
Still Wondering
Happy Birthday
Triumph anounced its 2009 line up in July.
MvAgusta announced it will be taking part in the EICMA at Milan. Life goes on even after the sale.
Moto Guzzi US updates us on their national rally preparations.
Ducati Investor relations focused on reorganization news while BMW was announcing quarterly news. Ducati's Reorganization plan
Ducati Motor Holding: Board of Directors - July 30th, 2008
autoweek.com: Toyota thinks small with the Winglet Scooter
2008 QTEL FIM ENDURANCE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP
08/06/2008
Preview: Round 4, Oschersleben 8 hours. Tough Challenge Ahead for Team BMW Motorrad Motorsport.
Munich. BMW Motorrad Motorsport's third race of the year is the fourth round of the Qtel FIM Endurance Championship taking place at the Oschersleben racetrack this Saturday August 9th. Last year, the team enjoyed fantastic results with a fifth and ninth overall and a first and second in their class, but this year the team faces an ever tougher challenge as the race distance has been reduced from twenty-four to eight hours.
This will undoubtedly favour the four cylinder machines as the race is now effectively a 'sprint' instead of a marathon. Nevertheless, BMW Motorrad Motorsport are keen on putting on a good show for their fans at their home race and will once again be fielding two teams running the HP2 Sport. In Oschersleben, bike number 17 will be ridden by Thomas Hinterreiter, Richard Cooper and Jose-Luis Nion and bike number 71 will be ridden by St?®phane Mertens, Rico Penzkofer and Gr?®gory Fastr?®. Twenty-eight year old Belgian Gr?®gory Fastr?® is the new addition to the team, but is no stranger to Endurance racing. He won this year's Barcelona 24 hours in the Stocksport class and has participated in Endurance racing since 2003.
Berti Hauser (Director of BMW Motorrad Motorsport)
Last year's race was fantastic for us, a special moment, but it will be hard to repeat that performance this year, because the race will be over eight hours instead of twenty-four. Our HP2 Sport suited the Oschersleben circuit quite well and its twisty nature meant that we were not at such a big disadvantage like some other tracks. What we lost in horsepower me made up for on handling and braking and because we were able to do less pit-stops then the four cylinder bikes meant that we stayed out on the track longer in between sessions.
We were a little disappointed to hear that this year's race would be just eight hours, because now it will favour the 1000 cc fours for sure. But Endurance racing is unpredictable and we know that our team will be well-prepared and ready to face this tough challenge. I am not going to try and predict the outcome of the race, but what I would like is for both bikes to come home safely and finish in the top fifteen overall.
autobloggreen.com: F1 is going green with KERS
autoweek.com has BWM de-Bangling and de-iDriving the 7-series in '09
autobloggreen.com has asks an interesting question, 'I hydrogen's future in the hands of Mazda's rotary engine? My oldest daughter and I had a first generation R7 seven that I LOVED. It handled like a go kart and had linear acceleration that was incredible. Unfortunately it was also one of the most polluting designs ever put in a car. But a hydrogen version would be clean and that linear acceleration that seemed to go on for ever, WOW.
autoweek.com: Volkswagen considers a coupe and roadster tandem. I like the Roadster idea, but then I am prejudice.
autospies.com is blaming the U.S. sales slump for Toyota trimming 800 Japanese jobs. Detroit workers may feel this is a form of revenge but at what cost?
BMW Group Canada puts a punctuation point on the motorcycle trend in the Americas.
BMW Group Canada achieves new sales records
BMW Motorrad Canada reported its third consecutive record month in July with sales of 203 units sold, up 23% compared to the same month the previous year. Year-to-date, Motorrad has retailed 1142 units, down 0.7% from last year.
This news piece from PressClub Africa gives a little insight into how strategy Number ONE is working its way through BMW. I must admit I still cringe a bit when I hear that companies are concentrating on their core business. It makes so much sense and yet even when said so many companies fail to do it.
BMW NA is in training mode.
BMW OF NORTH AMERICA, LLC SUPPORTS AUTOMOTIVE YOUTH EDUCATION; CORPORATION’S EASTERN REGION HEADQUARTERS PROVIDES
LEARNING LABORATORY FOR STUDENTS
08/04/2008
Donation Ceremony of BMW Vehicle to Local Passaic County Technical Institute Automotive Program of Rolling Automotive Laboratory
Woodcliff Lake, NJ - August 4, 2008... Passaic County Technical Institute students got a glimpse of their future with the donation of a BMW 745i which will be used as a state of the art automotive teaching tool. The students are members of Automotive Youth Educational Systems (AYES), a nationwide partnership among automotive manufacturers, participating dealers, and selected high/prep schools. This event was highlighted when Passaic County Technical
Institute received the vehicle Thursday, July 31, 2008 donated by BMW of North America, LLC (BMW NA) to the school at 11:00AM.
Gene Donnelly, Vice President for the Eastern Region of BMW North America, LLC stated that “It is essential that we continue to use opportunities like this to reach out to the technicians of the future and excite them about the many possibilities available with a career in the automobile industry. The technology in the cars today is advancing so rapidly that we need the best and the brightest to consider a career in our industry”.
The donation ceremony was held at the school (45 Reinhardt Rd., Wayne, NJ). Gene Donnelly presented the BMW 745i vehicle to be used as a “four-wheeled educational laboratory”. Passaic County Technical Institute’s Chief School Administrator, Diana Lobosco, accepted the car on behalf of Passaic County Technical Institute’s AYES-affiliated program Automotive Technology Program which will also benefit from the BMW curriculum offered at the high school.
Other senior administrators of Passaic County Technical Institute’s Board of Education also attended the Donation Ceremony.
“We are truly excited and thankful to BMW NA, LLC for providing Passaic County Technical Institute with a new lab vehicle,” said Larry Cummings, AYES President. “With the ongoing commitment and dedication from our OEM partners, our AYES Program will continue to be the first step in a long term solution to developing quality entry level technicians.”
In addition to BMW's collaboration with Passaic County Technical Institute and other AYES Programs across the state of New Jersey and the United States, BMW has actively developed programs to train service technicians. In 1986, as part of its ongoing commitment to educating the next generation of automotive technicians, BMW initiated the STEP (Service Technician Education Program) program to keep pace with the need for highly skilled service technicians.
STEP has since graduated more than 2,000 technicians from its eight regional training facilities throughout the U.S.
With more than 2 million BMWs on the road today, and new vehicle sales expected to reach 300,000 annually in the next few years, the need for highly skilled technicians to diagnose and repair these increasingly sophisticated automobiles continues to escalate. In fact, the acute shortage of qualified service technicians is a growing challenge for all automakers and dealers nationwide.
A great deal of career opportunity exists in the automotive services industry. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, an estimated 35,000 new automotive technician jobs are need each year through 2010.
Corporate news continues to roll out.
BMW Group: NTT Data takes over majority of Cirquent
01.08.2008
Sale of nearly 73% of Cirquent shares to NTT Data
Munich. The BMW Group has sold 72.9 percent of its shares in the IT consultancy company Cirquent GmbH to the Japanese company NTT Data. A purchase agreement to this effect was signed in Munich on 1 August. The BMW Group will thus still own 25.1percent of the IT consultancy company in the future. The outstanding 2 percent of the shares will continue to remain within Cirquent GmbH. Both partners have agreed not to disclose the purchase price. The closing of the transaction is subject to approval by the competition authorities.
"Within the scope of its Number ONE strategy, the BMW Group is concentrating on its core business. In NTT Data, we
have found the ideal partner to ensure that Cirquent will continue to develop further in the future", said Friedrich
Eichiner, member of the Board of Management of BMW AG responsible for Group and Brand Development.Cirquent was founded in 1971 as Softlab GmbH. In 1992, the Munich-based company was taken over by the BMW Group.
Last year, Cirquent posted sales worth € 286 million, with a workforce of 1,747. The range of services offered by the company covers the full spectrum, from business process consulting, through design, integration and implementation to the operation of IT systems.
Wonderings
Talk about the EICMA has me wondering what BMW has to unveil at the motorcycle shows this years.
Pieter De Waal, VP of BMW Motorrad NA, told the audience in a Gillette seminar one thing not to expect for a very long time; the long speculated replacement for the K 1200 LT. This may disappoint some of you but should not be unexpected. The market for the full size luxury tourer has declined even more steeply than other sectors of the market. Honda is moving its Goldwing production from the US to a brand new Asian plant. They may introduce a new model but they virtually own that segment of the motorcycle market. The more important thing for the plant change is the ability of the new plant to rapidly change models produced on the production line. Remember a key element of Strategy Number ONE is control of production volumes to more closely match market demand. Honda seems to be thinking along the same lines.
BMW Motorcycle Magazine, an independent publication, has been speculating that a scooter is in the works and could be announced in the near future. When asked there was no denial that it is being considered. It would not be a revival the ill fated C1 but rather a new version. It makes a certain amount of sense. Scooters are the hot part of the market and more and more are a socially acceptable entry point for all ages and genders to the two wheeled world. It would be marketed in the motorcycle dealerships instead of the car dealerships where the C1 was mistakenly placed.
We will see the street version of the S 1000 RR. BMW has street version to sell in order to meet homologation requirements for racing can be met. The promise is that they will be priced competitively with the Japanese liter bikes. Great, but MCN ran a piece yesterday that Japanese models will be raising their prices next year.
What else could be in store for the BMW fans and markets?
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F 800 Powered 2WD Dirt Bike by way of Winding Road
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