Summit Notebook
Exclusive outtakes from industry leaders
Q+A: Maria Fiorini Ramirez
I sat down with Maria Fiorini Ramirez today after she joined us at the Reuters Investment Outlook Summit and asked her about starting her own company — the global economic consulting firm Maria Fiorini Ramirez, Inc — her advice for young entrepreneurs, and if women can balance a successful work and home life.
Where you were you born? Naples, Italy
When did you come to the U.S? 1960. To East New York.
Did you go to high school there? Yes, St. Michael’s. An all girl’s Catholic school.
Where do you live now? Far Hills, New Jersey
Did you ever think that you were going to start your own business? Yes. And a global one because I always liked geography and history.
How Leo DiCaprio started a car company
Henrik Fisker, the storied car designer who has shaped Aston Martins, Fords and BMWs, told the Reuters Autos Summit this week that he now wants a starring role in the green revolution.
But he also wants to make the world safe for sports cars for generations to come.
“Being a car enthusiast and loving cars, to be quite honest, I could not imagine a life without a beautiful, fast sports car,” Fisker said. “I needed to do something to make sure that I could drive one of those nice cars, my children could drive one of those beautiful, fast cars.”
So what was Fisker’s inspiration? What was the epiphany when he realized that the world was ready for the upcoming Fisker Karma, a $90,000 plug-in hybrid with 50 miles of all-electric fun?
Leonardo DiCaprio…in a Prius.
“A couple of years ago it started, by people who were maybe a little ahead of their time. You saw some movie starts like Leonardo DiCaprio buying a Prius.
“He could have bought any car in the world, and I remember seeing that on television and thinking to myself, you know, when you’ve got a guy who could buy any Ferrari or Rolls Royce and he’s buying a Prius, you know something is changing dramatically.”
Choosing a car is bit difficult , since in the market wide range of cars are available. You need to consult an expert who can compare different branded cars. I prefer Eu Neuwagen to consult and get the right brand.
AUDIO – Mornings with Ron: A Reuters Autos Summit tradition
A few years ago, there was a book out called “Tuesdays with Morrie.” At Reuters, though, we spend our Tuesday mornings during Auto Summits with Ron.
It wouldn’t be a Reuters Autos Summit without our yearly visit from United Auto Workers head Ron Gettelfinger … at the crack of dawn.
Gettelfinger is not one to loaf around and show up at our summit at a leisurely hour of, say, sometime after the sun rises. Oh no. Gettelfinger was scheduled to kick off our Tuesday slate of guests at 7:00 am. But by now we know better.
In fact, when coming into the building this morning sometime after 6:00 am, Gettelfinger was already in the lobby of the Detroit Chamber of Commerce building doing a radio call-in program on his cell phone.
The sun would rise shortly thereafter.
But despite the hour, Gettelfinger is always an interesting person to interview, as he has his eye on all parts of the autos industry. And he didn’t disappoint this year, either.
Upstarts!
The U.S. government has pumped more than $100 billion into Detroit over the past year to keep automakers General Motors and Chrysler alive. But some of the sector’s remaining capitalists are having a hard time stomaching a $25 billion Department of Energy loan program intended to spark new developments in electric cars.
Start-ups Fisker Automotive and Tesla Motors have won about $1 billion in combined funding, while longtime players Ford and Nissan have received substantially larger loans from Washington to work on vehicle electrification — a technology the White House and many in the industry hope will reduce the United States’ dependence on imported oil and lower emissions of carbon dioxide, a leading greenhouse gas.
Funneling federal money to new entrants to the automaking world does not sit right with Tim Leuliette, chief executive of parts supplier Dura Automotive.
“If there’s a real market for electric vehicles, the OEMs will do it,” Leuliette said, using industry jargon for automakers. “We don’t need to have people who have never built a car in their life take $1 billion of our tax money and say ‘I can do it too.’”
Government funding muddles market signals, Leuliette argued at the Reuters Autos Summit in Detroit.
“When government writes a check, it says the smart money investors are hesitant to fund it,” Leuliette said. “When markets say it’s now wise enough … there’s more than enough money.”
For his part, the founder of Fisker Automotive — which aims to build plug-in hybrid cars at a former GM plant in Wilmington, Delaware — said government funding is a logical way to kick start a technology that private U.S. companies have been slow to focus on.
Toyota’s Arashima on Reuters Financial Television
Toyota Motor Europe President and CEO Tadashi Arashima talked to Reuters Financial Television during the Auto Summit in Paris. See here.
Toyota will not freeze out Iceland, bets on Russia bounce
The world’s biggest carmaker, Toyota, will not follow the road of McDonald’s and abandon Iceland even though it is selling ‘very few’ cars there at the moment and its distributor has been seized by the banks as its owner went belly-up, Toyota Motor Europe President and CEO Tadashi Arashima told the Reuters Auto Summit in Paris on Tuesday. “We have a big market share there, of 25 percent, and it is good for our after-sales,” Arashima said. The banks are trying to sell the distributor but Toyota does not plan to take ownership like it does in its key European markets of Germany, France, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom, and some Scandinavian countries.
Arashima said he believes the Russian market will recover sooner than many think, after the west European markets but well before the rest of East Europe — in 2011 or 2012.
In West Europe he does not see signs yet of a return of consumer confidence leading people to buy more expensive items such as cars and the showrooms remain quiet.
Europe traditionally had a low priority for Toyota, which mainly focused on the big U.S. market, and Arashima still has problems convincing headquarters in Toyota City that Europeans like diesel engines which are far from popular in Japan and the States.
It now produces cars in Britain and France and makes some 60 to 70 percent of its sales locally.
But the Lexus luxury brand is not really taking off in Europe as it competes with German rivals that have diesel, and has rather big engines that Europeans have started to dislike.
In the U.S. however, big is still beautiful. “Even though Americans drive slowly they still love big engines,” Arashima said.
McDonald’s didn’t really abandon Iceland. The same company is still running the same restaurants with almost the same menus using the name Metro. They just got rid of the McDonald’s franchise because it meant they had to import all ingredients which was too expensive given the current exchange rates. The change from McDonald’s to Metro took 5 hours.
AUDIO – Commercial real estate: The auto industry’s next big (bad) thing
The U.S. auto industry has had one heck of a year.Sales have fallen off, credit has been pretty much nonexistant and two of the major U.S. automakers were bankrupt. Other that all that, things were fine.But Bill Diehl, chief executive of advisory firm BBK, said at the first day of this year’s Reuters Autos Summit, that one of the main concerns for 2010 (if it’s not THE main concern) is the industry’s overall exposure to commercial real estate.We have been hearing about the problems with commercial real estate in many other sectors of the U.S. economy and Diehl gave the strongest statement so far about the auto side.(To hear Diehl\’s comments, please click here)The Reuters Autos Summit continues through Thursday in Detroit and Paris.
yeah, looking to be new,.really informative thank you for the post.
The secret lives of auto executives
Ed Whitacre sneaks off to breakfast at a Detroit greasy spoon. Sergio Marchionne’s attention to detail extends to the condition of his factories’ bathrooms. And Bill Ford helped save his great-grandfather’s company by hocking the blue oval.
These are just a few of the glimmers of top Detroit auto executives’ lives that you get when you sit down with Ron Gettelfinger, head of the United Auto Workers union.
Marchionne, the chief executive of Italian automaker Fiat — which pulled Chrysler out of bankruptcy this year, seems to be “extremely respectful” of his workforce, Gettelfinger told the Reuters Autos Summit in Detroit on Tuesday.
“I know he’s went out into the facilities and one of the things that he did was walk into the restroom to inspect it. Now you don’t normally see that happen,” Gettelfinger said. “But he truly believes in the power of the people, the value they add to the process.”
General Motors chairman Whitacre is also a fan of unannounced factory visits, a detail Gettelfinger may have picked up at one of their morning meetings.
“There’s a little dive up the street that we go up here and have breakfast sometimes,” Gettelfinger said.
He also recalled a call that came from then-Ford CEO Bill Ford three years ago, when the automaker was preparing a major debt offer — a move that helped it to be the only U.S. automaker to avoid bankruptcy this year.
Diehl: Ford & UAW need to “work at it” a little more…
William Diehl, chief executive of advisory firm BBK says Ford and the United Auto Workers union need to work a little harder to come to some sort of agreement that puts the automaker on a more level playing field with its rivals. Click here to listen to what he had to say at the 2009 Reuters Autos Summit.
Investors do not realise Valeo’s Asian potential-CEO
Valeo generates 18 percent of its sales in Asia, and 7 percent in China alone, and that percentage will increase due to fast organic growth in these booming markets, but investors still see Valeo as a company anchored in mature European markets.
“They still see us as mainly a west European company,” chief executive Jacques Aschenbroich told the Reuters Auto Summit in Paris. But despite a decline in turnover, Valeo is keeping up its research and development spending and is continuing to forge forward countries in China, Thailand, India, Turkey or Brazil.
In China, where Valeo grows at a rate of 20 percent, it recently took full control of a joint-venture that makes compressors and the group is reviewing all its six joint ventures in China as it aims to keep on growing fast. It has 500 million euros of sales in China and employs 5,000 people there.
This may mean fewer jobs in France and the rest of Europe in the end. The group is competing a 500 million euro cost-cut drive and will soon start talks with unions to discuss a simplification of the company.
There was also good news for French employees as Aschenbroich said that there were no ‘bleeders’ in the firm that needed drastic action and he also said that for many activities of Valeo the wage costs were not the determining factor for the localisation of a plant.
He also put an end to his predecessor’s plan to sell assets in order to raise funds for acquisitions.
