Wagoner Wins A Round

The second-quarter results were widely seen as a vindication of turnaround effort GM has mounted despite some criticism from Jerry York, who is now a member of GM's board and is the chief lieutenant of Kirk Kerkorian, GM's largest private shareholder.

MORE: Wagoner Wins A Round (7/30/2006)
Financial results buoy CEO's assertion that turnaround is working.

Chrysler Wants Healthcare Deal

DaimlerChrysler AG is pushing the United Auto Workers for concessions on healthcare similar to those the union has approved already for hourly workers at General Motors and Ford.
Tom LaSorda, Chrysler Group chief executive officer, said he spoke recently with UAW officials about the need for pattern-style bargaining and changes in the healthcare plans.
"We have met very, very recently with the UAW's top leadership and more meetings are planned. We talked about pattern bargaining and need to have the same arrangements as Ford and GM," he added.

MORE: Chrysler Wants Healthcare Deal (7/30/2006)
Latest numbers show UAW should give in, company says.

Gas Prices Stuck at $3

The price of gasoline remained around the $3 per gallon mark again last week, as the U.S. Department of Energy reported that prices nationwide went up 1.4 cents.

Motorists along the East Coast felt the biggest jump while more modest increases were also reported in the Midwest by the Energy Information Administration. The price of gasoline, however, fell by two cents in California, where the pump prices remain the highest at $3.22 per gallon.

Relief does not appear imminent. Even with the U.S. economy slowing, demand for gasoline has remained strong and the price of crude oil has stayed above $70 per barrel, hitting $73.24 a barrel on Friday on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Congress is scheduled to take a vote this week on opening more of the Gulf to offshore drilling. -Joe Szczesny

Plans for Smart are Rolling

Roger Penske, the chairman of the United Auto Group, says he has been thrilled by the response to the announcement that his company was teaming up with DaimlerChrysler AG to bring smart to the United States market. 

Penske noted during a conference call with analysts and journalists that the new smart Web site, www.smartusa.com, has already attracted some 200,000 visits. The visits resulted in another 8400 specific requests for information from potential buyers of the new car, which is being retooled for American standards prior to a launch in early 2008. In addition, Penske has gotten more than 400 requests from dealers who have expressed interest in becoming a part of the venture.

Penske emphasized that the new venture will use other dealerships beside those belonging to UAG. Initially, the smart venture will use between 30 and 50 dealerships but the total number could grow to 100 in a second wave of openings. Penske said UAG's plans will rely on auto shows around the country during 2007 to promote the introduction of the brand into the U.S.

UAG has already recruited David Schembri to head up the new organization. Schembri, a former Mercedes-Benz USA executive, was in charge of planning the smart launch in the U.S. before he migrated to Mitsubishi last year, later leaving that company.

Penske added that the introduction of smart in Canada went very well and exceeded DaimlerChrysler's expectations. The success in Canada was one of the factors that convinced DaimlerChrysler that smart could work in the U.S. as well. -Joe Szczesny

Brazil Gets C-Class Coupe

DaimlerChrysler says it will transfer all production of its C-Class Sports Coupé hatchback - no longer sold in the U.S. market - from Germany's Sindelfingen plant to its manufacturing unit in Juiz de Fora, Brazil. The plant had built A-Class vehicles until last year and C-Class sedans for the U.S., a product that will be phased out this year. The Sports Coupé will be assembled, starting in first quarter of 2007, from CKD assemblies brought from Germany, although its local content will rise to 35 percent. DaimlerChrysler says it will continue to sell the hatch in some markets after the new C-Class emerges at the Geneva Motor Show next year. -Fernando Calmon

From the Where Are They Now File…

From time to time, newspapers, magazines, and even TV entertain us with little feature stories about the whereabouts or doings of past newsmakers. 

Perhaps unconsciously, Sunday's New York Times did that with two very different entities: the old Bridgehampton sports car road-race track on Long Island, New York, and the 1957 Plymouth Belvedere hardtop coupe. 

Bridgehampton, according to a story in the Business section, has been turned into a money-only snooty golf club, where the initiation fee is a whopping $600,000 but supposedly no one cares whom your grandfather was or whether your sartorial taste is more akin to a rap artist than a Wall Streeter. The golf course even retains many of the old road-race course trappings such as discarded tires along cart paths and safety fencing around remnants of the track. The organizer of the club reportedly also collects vintage automobiles. I guess for now this is a better fate for Bridgehampton than a condo development.

The Plymouth is - or was - a then brand-new car buried in a time capsule in Oklahoma City, to be opened next June 15 on the half-century mark of its entombment.  According to a piece in the Times' Sport section, there is speculation on whether the 50-year-old "new" Plymouth will be a junky pile of rust or a pristine collector car worth $22,000. It was originally Cosmolined like an old Army rifle, wrapped up in plastic and coffined in a concrete-and-steel box. The automotive morticians even thoughtfully included ten gallons of gasoline and five quarts of motor oil in appropriate containers in the car's trunk - just in case such commodities were no longer available in the then-distant future, sort of like an Egyptian monarch of old. The car's recipient will be the person - or heir thereof - who most closely guessed Oklahoma City's 2007 population in a lottery held back in 1957. The disinterment next summer should be interesting. -Mike Davis 

FROM THE SOURCE headlines from the latest press releases

Goodyear Tires Selected for New Dodge Nitro

Name	Symbol	Last	Change
Autobytel, Inc.	ABTL	3.31	+0.10 (+3.12%)
Autoliv Inc.	ALV	55.57	+0.61 (+1.11%)
AutoNation Inc.	AN	20.08	+0.23 (+1.16%)
ArvinMeritor Inc.	ARM	16.24	+0.12 (+0.74%)
American Axle & Mfr. Holdings Inc.	AXL	16.26	-0.18 (-1.09%)
Ballard Power Systems Inc.	BLDP	6.00	-0.05 (-0.83%)
BorgWarner Inc.	BWA	60.23	+0.47 (+0.79%)
Cummins Inc.	CMI	115.60	+3.92 (+3.51%)
DaimlerChrysler AG (ADR)	DCX	51.58	+1.46 (+2.91%)
Dura Automotive Systems	DRRA	0.62	-0.07 (-10.14%)
Eaton Corporation	ETN	64.91	+1.23 (+1.93%)
Ford Motor Company	F	6.89	+0.06 (+0.88%)
General Motors Corporation	GM	32.35	+0.24 (+0.75%)
Gentex Corporation	GNTX	13.50	+0.31 (+2.35%)
Goodyear Tire & Rubber	GT	10.57	+0.27 (+2.62%)
Honda Motor Co. Ltd. (ADR)	HMC	33.53	+0.44 (+1.33%)
Johnson Controls Inc.	JCI	76.35	+1.32 (+1.76%)
Lear Corporation	LEA	22.82	-1.25 (-5.19%)
Magna International Inc.	MGA	74.20	+0.02 (+0.03%)
Motorola Inc.	MOT	22.49	+0.38 (+1.72%)
Nissan Motor Co. Ltd. (ADR)	NSANY	21.67	+0.21 (+0.98%)
Sonic Automotive Inc.	SAH	23.04	+0.53 (+2.35%)
Siemens AG	SI	80.55	+0.74 (+0.93%)
Sirius Satellite Radio	SIRI	4.14	+0.17 (+4.28%)
Toyota Motor Corporation (ADR)	TM	105.60	+2.50 (+2.42%)
TRW Automotive Holdings	TRW	25.77	+0.20 (+0.78%)
Tower Automotive Inc.	TWRAQ.PK	0.091	+0.001 (+1.11%)
United Auto Group Inc.	UAG	21.34	+0.58 (+2.79%)
Visteon Corporation	VC	6.88	+0.15 (+2.23%)
XM Satellite Radio Hold.	XMSR	12.67	+1.78 (+16.35%)