Sergio Marchionne on Time front cover

The head of Fiat/Chrysler is on the front page of Time mag.

The article recounts that this fusion shows all the signs of working well and Chysler is recovering well so far.

Opinions?

DAS

Reply to
DAS
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At the moment, it appears Fiat is doing everything I hoped and expected Daimler was going to do. There's a new Lancia on the LX platform; there've been substantial upgrades in the interiors of the Chrysler/Dodge products; there's a new Dart coming on an Alfa platform.

Reply to
Joe Pfeiffer

actually the dart will be fiat based, not Alfa

Reply to
Rob

ok correction.....straight from the horses mouth.

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actually the dart will be fiat based, not Alfa>

Reply to
Rob

The (extensive) Time article also discussed issues like (Italian) management attitudes, fit of product lines, elimination of badge engineering, clarity of product segment identity and so on. Although there is little reference to Daimler (who were not, after all, the last owners) it seems things are going much better with Fiat (maybe because SM is in charge).

It seems to me that the aims and needs of the Daimler and Fiat managements are quite different. As is widely known, Fiat automotive division itself was a bit of a basket case before SM, though a lot of people forget that the best 'mass' supercar manufacturer ever (Ferrari) is also in the Fiat stable.

DAS

Reply to
DAS

The other day I was startled to see a picture of an Alfa in large advertisement in a major UK paper and then noticing the Chrysler logo...

:-) DAS

Reply to
DAS

But what startled you, and why? The Alpha, the logo, or both?

Reply to
Patok

I saw a picture of a car that was 'obviously' an Alfa Romeo (not "Alpha"...) and then finding it was a advert for a Chrysler. In Europe. That was startling, and then amusing. Then my thought was, "Why would anyone buy a Chrysler looking like an Alfa, when you can readily buy an Alfa...?..." The Alfa brand name is much more evocative here (even bearing in mind the old rusting problems).

I since read that the Chrysler version is not identical (slightly bigger and, I think, a different interior) but that was not visible in a glance at an advert picture.

Hitherto Chryslers had looked distinctively different, e.g. Jeep and Grand Voyager (what appear to the most common in UK anyway).

The Sebring convertible never looked like a Mercedes CLK, nor did the Crossfire look like an SLK.

DAS

Reply to
DAS

Thanks for the explanation. (Yeah, I know how Alfa Romeo is spelled, but automatically typed Alpha in isolation.) :) The same strangeness abput selling one brand instead of another existed in the States with Geo. And while it *might* have made some sense to sell rebadged Suzukis, why would they do it with Toyotas? It wasn't some obscure brand, like. :)

Reply to
Patok

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