Category Archives: marketing

First Look – 2024 Toyota RAV4 Compact SUV

The 2.5-liter 4-cylinder powered RAV4 is available in LE, XLE, XLE Premium, and Limited with either FWD or All Wheel Drive (AWD), as well as the Adventure and TRD Off Road grades with AWD standard. Continue reading

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Elena Ford and William Clay Ford III in New Roles at Ford Motor

Ford also announced that Lisa Materazzo, previously Toyota’s top marketing executive in North America, is joining Ford as global chief marketing officer effective today, reporting to Ford President and CEO Jim Farley. At Toyota, Materazzo also held positions at Lexus and Scion. At Ford, Materazzo will lead advanced product planning and all marketing activities across Ford Blue, Ford Model e and Ford Pro. She will also oversee Ford Performance and Lincoln. Senior Marketing positions have experienced some churn at Ford recently. Continue reading

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GM Expanding Google Cloud AI Initiatives

However, in AutoInformed’s view there are insufficient regulations and guidelines in the industry about who owns your personal data and how it is used or sold to other entities. Therefore this might not be good for everyone or the sun might not be so sunny in a personal vale. Continue reading

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Annals of Marketing – 2024 Toyota Tacoma in Blue Beetle

Toyota (NYSE:TM) is marketing the 2024 Tacoma pickup with DC’s newest Superhero in his debut movie, “Blue Beetle,” which made its world premiere in theaters last week. The action movie uses multiple generations of Tacoma as Jaime Reyes is forever changed when an ancient piece of alien technology, the Scarab (no relation to the car) transforms the college grad into the hero – The Blue Beetle. Continue reading

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Mustang GTD – Street Legal 800 Hp Starting at $300,000

“Mustang GTD shatters every preconceived notion of a supercar,” said Jim Farley, Ford president and CEO. “This is a new approach for us. We didn’t engineer a road car for the track, we created a race car for the road. Mustang GTD takes racing technology from our Mustang GT3 race car, wraps it in a carbon fiber Mustang body and unleashes it for the street.”   Continue reading

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Annals of Marketing – Detroit Auto Show and Shinola

The Detroit Auto Show and Shinola have announced a new partnership, bringing together two well-known Detroit brands. Less than one month away from its introduction as a watch, Shinola’s new Canfield Speedway Lap 06  face will countdown the days, hours, minutes and seconds to the start of the Detroit Auto Show on NAIAS.com. Continue reading

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World Debut of the Acura ZDX at Monterey Car Week

The largish – grotesque to some AutoInformed readers – ZDX is being co-developed with GM using the highly flexible global EV platform powered by Ultium batteries. What fun for brand managers – a common platform for Cadillac and Acura SUVs? Acura eventually will launch additional EV models starting in 2026 based on the company’s own global EV Architecture. Continue reading

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First Look – 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser

Toyota (NYSE: TM) has finally officially acknowledged that its longest-running nameplate will return to the North American after a three-year hiatus. Moreover,  the off-road vehicle is less expensive with a MSRP in the mid-$50,000 range. (The Lexus LX 600 version of the platform is on sale now in the US at ~$100,000.) Now built off of the less expensive TNGA-F global truck platform, the new Land Cruiser is available with the range-topping i-FORCE MAX hybrid powertrain producing 326 horsepower and 465 lb.-ft. of torque. Continue reading

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Toyota China Re-Org as EV and Trade Wars Proceed

“The Chinese market is growing at an unprecedented pace,” said Tatsuro Ueda, Chief Executive Officer of the China Region. “Toyota will also work together as a group to reform how we work and think to survive in China.” Continue reading

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Artificial Intelligence – J.D. Power and Palantir Technologies

J.D. Power, a data and analytics company today announced a collaboration with Palantir Technologies Inc., (NYSE: PLTR) to develop generative artificial intelligence (AI) and predictive analytics solutions that it claimed, “will facilitate deeper insights and more strategic decision making by … Continue reading

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Chevrolet Bolt Returning as Affordable EV

“Our customers love today’s Bolt. It has been delivering record sales and some of the highest customer satisfaction and loyalty scores in the industry,” said Barra. “It’s also an important source of conquest sales for the company and for Chevrolet. We will keep the momentum going by delivering a new Bolt…and we will execute it more quickly compared to an all-new program with significantly lower engineering expense and capital investment by updating the vehicle with Ultium and Ultifi technologies and by applying our ‘winning with simplicity’ discipline.” Continue reading

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Tesla – Solid Q2 with Higher Production and Lower Prices but…

During Q2 2023 Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) made  ~480,000 vehicles and delivered more than 466,000, the highest to date. As a result, Q2-2023 looked solid with Tesla setting its production and deliveries among its top five quarters. The result was revenue approaching $25B in a single quarter. Net revenue was $2.7 billion. However, analysts remain skeptical about what many of them say is a greatly overvalued stock that pays no dividends.  During the past year a share of TSLA stock has ranged from ~$102 to $315. It’s currently trading ~$260. (AutoInformed: Ford Cuts F-150 Lightning Prices by $6000 to $10,000) Continue reading

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Ford Cuts F-150 Lightning Prices by $6000 to $10,000

Ford Motor said today that it is lowering the MSRP of F-150 Lightning® electric vehicle for all customers by $6000 to $10,000. The largest cuts are on the least expensive models. The Rouge Electric Vehicle Center in Michigan is currently closed completing changes that will triple the plant’s annual capacity to a targeted 150,000 F-150 Lightning trucks beginning this fall. Tesla, of course, surprised the industry with its recent price cuts. The increasing supply of semi-conductors is also adding to downward pricing pressure. Continue reading

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Chevrolet Traverse Adds Off-Road Z71 Model for 2024

The new Chevrolet Traverse in the fiercely competitive mid-size SUV segment is joining the off-road parade in both the US and Canada during the 2024 model year, Chevrolet said this morning. Chevy also said it has more SUV-like proportions, key safety features with families in mind, and more horsepower. It also has the new-age equivalent of a bold, new grille. Continue reading

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Lotus Eletre SUV EV at Goodwood

Lotus has held its first ever UK test drives for its hyper-SUV – the Lotus Eletre – at the Goodwood Motor Circuit last Sunday as part of a new electric vehicle promotional event staged in conjunction with the Festival of Speed or is that now a festival of marketing? The Lotus Eletre claims to be the first of a new breed of pure electric performance SUVs. It is positioned as a “lifestyle vehicle.” The first customer deliveries of the hyper-SUV are expected in the coming months. Continue reading

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