Hyping-up sports sponsorship in a receding economy - but does it work? #cycling #marketing

This free commentary is about professional cycling and related sponsorship, but generalises easily to any sport. It also is offered as opinion only. Whilst it represents honest analysis no non-public information is used and no guarantees are made.

Bearing in mind the state of the European economy in particular (given that pro cycling is heavily Euro-centric) and the pressing need to retain existing sporting sponsorships, you'd expect to see winning ProTour cycle-racing teams spruik both their successes and the pay-off for the sponsors. And thus in that context we see the Columbia-High Road team quoted in Cyclingnews:

Team Columbia-Highroad's domination of the first week of this year's Giro d'Italia has provided the team's sponsors with valuable brand visibility. In the first 10 days of racing the team garnered four stage wins and three days in the race leader's maglia rosa. Coupled with the added attention to the race due to centenary edition and the presence of Lance Armstrong, the value on the team's press is staggering. "This race has much bigger coverage than it did last year, I would say in the [leader's] jersey is worth around a million euro in advertising a day," the team's general manager, Bob Stapleton, told Cyclingnews. The leader's jersey went to Columbia-Highroad after the opening day's stage on Venice's Lido. Columbia's Mark Cavendish led over the line in the team time trial and wore the maglia rosa for the following two days.

It helps to be successful, of course, but even the smaller teams can have their day. Whilst the leader on the road is clearly the most-watched rider, anyone from any team can have a crack at a breakaway. For these teams a long, heroic and probably fruitless breakaway or - probably even better - a stage win in a Grand Tour (like the Giro or the Tour de France) can make or break a sponsorship deal. With intense European (and growing US) TV and general media coverage a team can leverage that exposure to delight existing sponsors and hopefully attract new ones. But competition for sponsorship cash is intense, both within and between sports, especially so when all indicators point downwards.

Without media focus a team may struggle for sponsorship. A dwindling team budget usually meaning fewer star riders and fewer successes - a downward spiral indeed. If the stakes are high for the sport, the payoff for the sponsor is just as critical. Marketing and advertising budgets are under stress as companies look for high returns at low risk. So in these straightened economic times, is such sporting sponsorship truly worth the investment?

On one level it's quite simple to verify a figure like the 1,000,000 Euro quoted above; just by adding up the minutes of clear TV exposure (when the sponsor's name is prominently shown) and the number of sponsor-name references made in the press or on radio, on enthusiast websites and blogs and so forth and multiplying by the typical advertising rates that would apply is a quick and dirty approximation. What's missed in that calculation is the number of spectators who may have caught the event live - a large number indeed in a travelling circus like a 3-week Grand Tour. You could do an approximation. But what does that 1,000,000 Euro number actually mean?

Not a lot, really. You can garner as much exposure as you like - be it by paid advertising or not - but if it's not targeted, what's the point? And if the exposure doesn't convert to a sale, well you've not won many friends among your shareholders. Of course you could try to write it off as a branding exercise (like stadium naming rights, for example), something that may in theory leave a brand memory that will trigger a later sale if and when the stars align. In pro cycling Mapei is a classic case. An Italian ceramics and adhesives company with a long and distinguished sponsorship of cycling, despite largely pulling out of the sport some years ago, Mapei remains a high-recognition name amongst cycle-sport enthusiasts world wide. But cycling fans don't need to buy floor tiles every day, do they? Hopefully enough such fans do remember and act on their fond memory of Mapei riders when they update their bathrooms (or their Opera House roofs, for that matter). Hopefully.

But in the case of the Columbia-Highroad team it does make sense on several levels. Firstly, the lead sponsor (Columbia apparel) appears in the team name as well as on the pro cyclist's jerseys, guaranteeing at least the level of potential exposure I mentioned above. (A nice spin off of team success will also be that non-professional race and recreational riders will seek out, buy and wear your branded jersey, too. In this way Mapei continues to trade on their sponsorship, years later.)

Secondly, it's targeted better than most sports advertising, in that Columbia is a specialist outerwear company with a good likelihood of translating the cycling enthusiast's general outdoor interest into sales of "adventure clothing", ski jackets and the like. Coupling cyclesport sponsorship with the company's corporate strategy of diversification and global expansion also makes sense. If Columbia, a US-based company, wants European exposure in the right demographics, it can hardly do better than pro cycling. Interestingly, whilst pro cycling is a long-established sport world-wide, it was momentarily (from about 1940 onwards) knocked on the head by the motor car in markets like the US and Australia. As the car industry and motorsport has subsequently become painted with a (much deserved) anti-environmental brush in more recent times, so we can expect to see a global resurgence in interest in bicycling, both recreationally and in professional racing terms. The 'Lance Armstrong effect' is a handy assistance, too.

But is it working? We don't have sales figures to look at (but we could find them if we wanted to trawl the web) nor can we easily do any statistical work to find the underlying correlations, but we can at least check out the Web stats.

Let's start with the team itself. If we do a search on Alexa we find that highroadsports.com (the ProTour team) is not amongst the top 100,000 sites, at least by Alexa's ranking (it's currently just under the #800,000 mark). Indeed the stats suggest that the team site has dropped in "reach" by 10% over the last 3 months. (Traffic may be seasonal, strongly coupled with specific races and indeed results.) The stats also tell us that the site is garnering 46% of its traffic from an aggregate of "other" countries, 30% from the US, 15% from Belgium and almost 8% from France. Indeed the team site ranks inside the top 30 in cycling-mad Belgium. Presumably the team's success at the Giro in May will drive more traffic from Italy, but it's not apparent as yet. (At least from these stats.) Alexa also offers some interesting demographic data if you want to delve further.

And how are the sponsors going? Alexa tells us that Columbia's web site ranks in the top 72,000 of all sites. Almost 60% of the recent traffic originates from the US, with "other" next, then China, Austria, Greece, Canada and Germany all between 2.6% and 4.8%. I'd guess that traffic may be seasonal with a bias towards winter clothing and colder countries (although Indonesia is a standout at 1.5%). The 3-month trend shows traffic down 36%, which again may correlate more closely with weather and the economic climate than anything else. Whilst at first glance this dip in traffic is disappointing, if we seriously wanted to explore the success of this sponsorship (and draw any serious conclusions) we'd need to remove the seasonality from the stats and focus on some clear targets for decomposition, regression and correlation. We'd also want to look at the sales figures by country, too and define our target period closely.

For comparison, checkout Google's search trend site for columbia.com. It looks like a steady decline in search requests over 3 years or so after a big launch. Of course you'd expect that people would search for a company that's promoting a launch, but you'd also hope to see some sort of spike when doing promotions.

So how about the team's minor sponsors, their "partners" ? I won't do any sort of specific analysis, but it's clear that - as you'd expect - these include mostly cycling-specific companies (like Shimano, if you exclude the fishing gear!), with the exception of the humanitarian Right To Play organisation. Now you may expect that the sponsors will show up in the upstream and downstream clickstream, but according to Alexa the biggest generator of clicks for Highroad as well as the biggest downstream receiver is one specific online bike shop. The connection? A "store" link on the Highroad site. I'm assuming that's a powerful and profitable relationship for that bike shop!

Alexa also offers "related links" for Highroad. I'm not yet sure how this is generated, but the main sponsor shows up top of that list. 2nd highest beneficiary is where we started this journey - Cyclingnews.com, followed by a group of bike messengers and some other pro cycling teams. If I was a minor sponsor with an interest in generating more web traffic I'd be looking at Highroad's server stats, doing some analysis and making some cogent suggestions.

There are better, more precise ways to go about analysing marketing data than looking at web traffic alone, and there are better sources of web stats than what Alexa's free service alone provides. But after all, what can you expect for free?

The NSW Police are not @nswpolice but claim to be non-existent @NSW_Police

It does get complicated online, doesn't it?

NSW Police Public Affairs Director Strath Gordon says he is unsure whether the person is a police officer, or a member of the community simply interested in police affairs. "We're obviously seeking to get into that space, and we're talking to Twitter about their impersonation policy," he said. Police have started "twittering" under their own alternative name - "@NSW_Police" - but Mr Gordon says he is concerned that users are more likely to trust tweets from the unofficial account due to its name.

Shame. I was enjoying @nswpolice, too. But when I search for @NSW_Police I find... only the apparent fake. Is the press release ahead of reality?

Football journo sides with climate change scientists to 'prove' League really OK after all

I can't believe that I read this para of support for legitimate climate science in a football commentator's diatribe on why Rugby League's culture of shame is really OK after all:

The current debate about behaviour in rugby league is a lot like the one surrounding climate change. Although global warming is scientifically undisputed, stubborn naysayers are often granted equal airtime, which gives the impression that the issue is somehow in dispute. And perception is reality.

That slash at the climate change sceptics aside, Josh Massoud of the Sydney Daily Telegraph was making the somewhat tenuous point that because he had made an early-morning micturation on the shrubby verge of a near-deserted expressway, miles from any public toilets and away from any camera, it was OK for prominent Rugby League players to do the same in a public street, on a wall, near a pub. And sadly, near a guy with a camera. Yep, I'm convinced.

Diabetic Aussie bike racer saves passenger on NWA flight, gets $10 voucher..

It's not what I expected to read, but there it was... "They gave me a $10 voucher to use at the airport but by the time we arrived, everything was closed for the night," Bennett said. "This wasn't about recognition anyway. I just wanted to make sure the guy was all right."

As Cyclingnews reported: "Simon Bennett, a rider on Team Type 1's development cycling squad, put his training in first aid to work Thursday night to save the life of a man who collapsed on board a Northwest Airlines flight. Bennett used an automatic external defibrillator (AED) and portable oxygen tank to revive the man, whose heart stopped during the flight from Minneapolis to Chicago."

First Aid certificates can come in handy, after all.

My picky, overly pedantic dig at the last few days of news #media #language

Picky, picky, picky. Sometimes I can't help myself.

Today, from Cyclingnews.com, and yes it could be a translation problem, but for the record:

Quick Step has announced it will extend Tom Boonen’s suspension but not fire the rider who has tested positive for cocaine for the third time. The reigning Paris-Roubaix champion will undergo a psychiatric treatment plan and be subject to strict testing by Quick Step over the next 12 months.

Psychiatric treatment? Have they gone mad? I think they need a behaviour management plan written by a psychologist. There is a difference, guys.

Yesterday, from the Australian, reportedly the "online newspaper of the year":

Qantas to retain Brisbane hangar for maintainting Airbus 330 fleet

I was going to let "maintainting" through to the keeper but then...

Qantas' large hangar at Brisbane Airport is currently used to service its Boeing 767 fleet, but over the next five years this work will progressivly be taken overseas.

I thought "progressivly" less inclined to let them off the hook. Busy day, too busy to run the old eye over the copy? Ahhh, it's only online, it doesn't matter! No wonder they are the "online newspaper" of choice!

And from Carsguide, this gem:

It's been 20 years since the birth of the Mazda MX-5 but time has hurried and the car remains almost unmistakable from its ancestor.

'Almost unmistakable' from its ancestor? So the writer is saying that it's not mistakable, almost. So in fact it is 'mistakable'? Now I could be mistaken but I think they meant to say 'almost indistinguishable'. Perhaps it was translated into English from a Japanese press release, although attribution is to a Neil Dowling of the Mercury. I thought that would do me until I read the very next para:

It is becoming the Galapagos turtle of the motoring world — fascinating in its ability to look its age when born and exactly the same a century later.

Oh dear, this is just priceless... a car - purportedly a sports car - that is not only akin to a giant turtle that takes 40 years to grow to maturity but "fascinating in its ability to look its age when born"! As Wikipedia attests, it hatched from an egg and looks like a baby turtle... the mind boggles with thoughts of what animals, vegetables or manufactured goods do not look their age when born... and boggles again when said creature (or car) doesn't change appearance in 100 years. I think Neil meant to say that it it hasn't changed much in overall shape, just gotten somewhat bigger. There, that's not hard, is it?

Berejiklian draws a surprising and tenuous link between Sydney buses and Gorbachev

This is one transport connection I never expected anyone, let alone Gladys Berejiklian, would make: The million-kilometre-plus buses date back to the Cold War era. "Some of the buses on the roads today were commissioned before Mikhail Gorbachev became leader of the Soviet Union," she said.

Mikhail must be on her mind. Of course Ms Berejiklian needn't have made a FOI application to get similar info, as Wikipedia tells us all about these dogged diesels in detail. And she can sate her newfound bus interest at the Bus and Truck Museum, too. Admittedly the world has moved on since Gorby was in power, but I don't think he had much to do with the purchase of the long-lasting diesel Mercedes buses in question. Perhaps we should have stuck with Leylands instead? Now I wonder how long we hung onto those green and cream Leyland and AEC single and double deckers way back when? Anyone like to hazard a guess around the 20 year mark?

Now Rees is stealing from kids with a disability.. has he no shame? #media #politics

First up, let me say that I fully support effective funding for programs that assist people with a disability to reach their potential as human beings in a caring society. (And by definition that means all of us, varying only by degree and by our own recognition - or not - of ours and others' abilities. ) That means removing cultural roadblocks to change, including any distortions or misrepresentations by politicians, lobbyists of various kinds and the mass media. With that in mind, let me press on...

This is a story about several groups trying to leverage an issue to achieve an end. The issue itself becomes burdened with hangers-on and it becomes hard to tell who's really wanting what for or from whom; but the nub of it is that kids with a disability will be 'missing out' because the NSW State government bureaucracy wants to reassign unspent monies (ie to other programs, elsewhere).

Well first of all, IMHO this happens every year, and indeed school principals have been accused of hoarding cash from year to year, possibly with a larger goal in mind, or simply through an inability to properly manage their budgets. I'm sure there are many highly skilled, competent principals in the State system, but I am equally sure that many others need help with financial strategy, planning and execution. There is no secret about this, or about the yearly "issue" of 'use it or lose it'. Every state government department goes about this practice, every year.

So today we read this: PRINCIPALS are accusing the Rees Government of a "grubby grab" for more than $12 million in unspent funds sitting in school bank accounts.. That's para one. If you go to that page online and search, you'll find that there is no attribution for the "grubby grab" remark. We don't know how many principals are involved, as all we have is a quote from the chair of a forum: Cheryl McBride, the chairwoman of the Public Schools Principals' Forum, warned yesterday the Government was slashing funding for students. Presumably the 'grubby grab' quote is an invention by the newspaper in question. There is, thankfully, an opposing view provided: However, DET Deputy Director-General Trevor Fletcher denied there had been a reduction in any school's allocation for 2009. He said some schools had built up more funds than they could hope to spend on programs for which the money was earmarked.

Whatever the truth, the headline is all about Premier Rees and his grubby grab, and nothing about addressing real issues for school kids with a disability. There are resources made available by both the Federal and State governments, and to my (admittedly limited) understanding the problem is more that the individual needs of students are not properly assessed and addressed by the schools concerned. Simply, the right approaches are not made by the right people in a timely fashion, leaving cash at the bank. I could be wrong, but that may be the real issue, not this supposed "grubby grab".

The more that I see the traditional media pour scorn on NSW Premier Nathan Rees the more I imagine that the public will see an underdog being kicked by bullies. (Not enough to save this government, perhaps, but surely it will be a factor over time.) Now Rees is ostensibly in power, but you'd hardly get that impression from the pack of hounds constantly baying for blood.

It's become a running joke. It sometimes appears that if any State government department does anything that upsets anyone, there's a story printed, and always it's a distortion, and always it's the fault of the NSW premier. I hope he is enjoying his time in the hot seat. The real power may lie elsewhere.

Slack maths education helps Terrorgraph beat up parrot hate over logging #environment #media

Ahhh, the Terrorgraph's definition of lunacy is a solid one:

IN THE middle of the worst economic crisis since the 1930s, the Federal Government's decision to enact a law that will knowingly put 1000 people out of work in NSW is nothing but sheer lunacy.

Now no-one wants to deliberately put people's jobs at risk, but sometimes it's better to paint things black and white, isn't it? To the Daily Telegraph it's jobs before everything else, no matter what. Especially if it'll sell newspapers, too.

But does the maths stack up? Let's see, 1000 jobs. That's made up of:

A Forests NSW briefing note obtained by The Daily Telegraph warned 11 sawmills would be forced to close overnight and 800 people would lose their jobs along with the closure of an industry worth $60 million to the NSW economy.

Well 800 is close to 1,000. Small rounding error. But the Tele can do better, and it does:

The State Government is seeking an urgent meeting with Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Mr Garrett, claiming the intervention by the Commonwealth to declare the logging illegal would cause the immediate loss of at least 500 timber jobs and 360 indirectly related jobs.

Now that's closer. 500 + 360 definitely feels like 1,000 now. So let's go with that. (Sadly there is no push here to correct the obviously ineffective teaching of mathematics to journalists.)

Whilst we're here, let's make out that the parrot at the centre of this issue is making no effort to adjust in this matter, despite the seriousness of the issue. Indeed the parrot is making out that there's a big problem when in fact it simply does not like flying over open spaces. So parrot, the Tele's advice to you is to get over it - literally.

Now I have spoken with these parrots and they are seeking professional help immediately. As a species with a fear of open spaces (and let's face it, if you were a brightly coloured small-medium parrot that was exposed to loss of life and wing by birds of prey, you'd feel a bit exposed too) they qualify for Federal Government rebates for psychological counselling. Hopefully the Tele won't squash that temporary stimulus assistance as well.

Mind you, it's not just parrots that offend the Tele. They also have it in for 'middle class' working mothers taking paid maternity leave:

The main targets are new mums earning a lot less, and who might not be able to confidently have a family without assistance. But slipping $260 million a year to women who might be among the top 10 per cent of wage earners doesn't sound like tough and rigorous Budget discipline.

The angle here is that middle-class women (whoever they are, but obviously they earn up to $150,000) don't deserve further assistance - they are well enough off already; but really it's just that the Tele's editor believes that the paper's readership can't hack the idea that working women can be successful, earn decent money and be an integral part of an Aussie family's "breadwinning" process. If they earn over the average wage then they don't deserve to be temporarily supported by the community whilst they are caring for newborns - except by their husbands, of course. Bizarre, I know, but that's the 1950s for you.

Discarded 9 newsreader finally let off leash... the glory days remembered #media #Sydney

How the world turns. Sydney television was a wonderful thing in the early-to-mid 1980s, when I was a young technical sales rep eager to get about and visit these citadels of televisual magic, high on their respective hilltops.

A must-visit was the ABC studios at Gore Hill, a ramshackle bunch of buildings that could have housed the CSIRO as easily as a national broadcaster (except that the CSIRO generally had the better, more modern buildings). But they loved visitors, if said visitor could only find their way to the appropriate door without being runover or falling into a pit. One false step and the historic Gore Hill Cemetery (handily next door) beckoned.

And there was Channel 7, high on its hill at Mobb's Lane, far and away the most technically adept, keen to show off to anyone who passed by their back-door tennis courts and helipad their exceptional broadcasting prowess. Look here at this state-of-the-art computer-based logo-promo creation studio thingy that we kindly allow the other, less well endowed TV stations and advertising agencies use. Look at our stunning teletext, right at the front door so you can't miss it - yes, a streaming text service! One day everyone will want one of these! And out the side door, past the temperamental stars to the magical world of heli-borne outside broadcast. Wonderment. There I was, but a callow youth selling patch cords, connectors and RF gear to the masters of invention.

Or take a look at (then) relative youngster Channel 10, standing proud at the corner of Epping and Delhi Roads. Clean, fresh, brash and full of challenge and hope. With (of course) a helipad, and plenty of parking. And massive blow-up pics of their stars in the foyer.

Impressive. But I haven't introduced the main player of this era, the champion of the ratings: Channel 9, Artarmon. What a surprise on first visit, almost a let-down yet quaint in a way. Here we are in a typically leafy northern suburban street... and suddenly there it is, in all its unprepossessing glory. A gatehouse. A tiny parking area and the firm direction that I could go in but be quick - and whatever you do, don't park in Jim Waley's spot! I took that instruction to heart, wondering all the while what powers of destruction a Sunday news presenter could muster. Later I visited the impressive Channel 9 "extensions", namely a house next door. This was the ratings leader?

Which brings me to today, when all that I have written above has turned on its head: DUMPED Nine news veteran Jim Waley has broken his silence and damned his former TV home, which he says is now "fighting for its life."

A new world indeed. A game of Internet Convergence anyone?

Football, meat pies, kangaroos etc.. funny strange how it all links together #marketing #GM #rugbyleague

In my bizarre world it all makes sense. GM is a big US brand-accumulator that has taken over popular national car-making brands in several countries, such as Opel in Germany, Vauxhall in the UK and of course Holden in Australia. In doing so they have managed to either submerge the link with GM from public view, such as they have done with SAAB in Sweden, or use it to their advantage, as they did with the much grander-sounding General Motors-Holden's Ltd (since renamed). In this way GM has become huge, feasting on the success of brands both in the US and across the world. To complete the sleight of hand in Australia GM's advertising agency re-worded a very patriotic-sounding Chevrolet jingle that suited the US market to fit the Australian environment. That sort of pragmatic, yet shallow and empty marketing resonated with the public at the time, but to me has set the scene for what ultimately may be the end of the whole "as Aussie as a Holden" charade.

'Football, meat pies, kangaroos and Holden cars', goes the jingle. Ahhh, football. But which kind?

Well in Sydney, traditionally, it has been Rugby League, a professional working class spin-off from the proudly traditional 'amateur' code of Rugby Union. And of course Union is no longer amateur and the 'working class' League players (at least at the top end) are now as well off as any local pro sports star. As in very nicely paid, thank you. Which brings me to the whole system of competition, which has evolved over the last 20 or so years from a district-centred and loyalty-bound operation to a national comp where only the richest clubs can afford the best players and coaches (salary cap duly noted) and loyalty is largely meaningless, or very short-term. Yes, there are exceptions, in pockets of resistance (Souths and St George, perhaps, and maybe a couple of other clubs to varying degrees). But in essence the local developmental pathways that ensured local support have been eroded, leaving what remains of the loyal supporters clinging to a brand name rather than a meaningfully real entity. Whole clubs have been sacrificed at the altar of cash and flung into oblivion. Where those fans went I don't know - well actually I do, as I simply lost interest. Now I just look for the results, almost totally disengaged from any sort of active support. I won't be taking my kids to a game, I can tell you. Given the ill-disciplined attention seeking of these gifted but arguably over-paid "athletes", I'd rather they play - or watch - soccer instead.

OK, I know, that's professional sport these days. But some sports - cycling for example - have managed to merge the pros and the amateurs, retain the grass-roots club network and create a successful professional system without the same smell of filthy lucre. It doesn't help that the main financial underpinnings of Australia's Rugby League football clubs are the gambling dens of the leagues clubs and the money-hungry alcohol manufacturers.

Why am I thinking about all this? Well I read this statement:"I find it astonishing that someone would make those comments when they aren't even part of the NRL." That's someone from the Cronulla club (in financial peril and wanting to save themselves by playing a few more games 140km or more north at Gosford) having a go at someone who lives on the Central Coast but runs one of the clubs (Norths) that was outed from the national league some years ago. You can get all the sordid details at that link. Point is, Cronulla (itself a spin-off from the St George club) has about as much to do morally, ethically and culturally with the Central Coast as GM has to do with Holden. Perhaps even less, as at least GM rescued Holden's in the first place. Either way, it's all about money. They may spin a nice yarn, but I can't imagine anyone believing it. And as the 'astonished' Cronulla spokesperson said, if you aren't part of the national league, don't even bother commenting. The arrogance.

And in my bizarre world, that's the link. The short-term, dollar-focused arrogance with which consumers have been treated by the National Rugby League is akin to the ever-thirstier-and-ever-bigger car-making arrogance shown by GM. And we know where GM is right now - staring into the abyss.

Picky picky picky - it's about Aussie cars and diesels but I just like pulling words and sentences apart #GM #language

In an idle moment I read this and instantly - and pedantically - thought it made no sense:

Harding is looking for an engine capable of a six-second 0-100km/h sprint time.

Obviously engines alone aren't capable of sprinting to 100km/h, unless you are measuring piston velocity; in which case this is a sluggish engine indeed. What they really wanted to say was that they are looking for an engine that would enable a vehicle of a pre-determined weight and aerodynamic drag coefficient to achieve the quoted performance. I guess they wanted brevity, but I am in a picky mood.

As an aside, why would you want a large sedan car such as the Holden Commodore, or any car for that matter, to meet a target of 6 seconds to 100km/h? Sure, it's to meet "the market benchmark" for performance sedan cars, but haven't we gotten over that faster-is-always-better mentality? Apparently not.

The article is suggesting, BTW, that Aussie GM arm Holden could fit into GM-Vauxhall's large (and possibly medium-sized) car rebadging plans, if and when Opel gets hived off to, say, FIAT. What a grand idea, shipping outdated, overweight Aussie cars thousands of kilometres across the globe against a backdrop of declining oil reserves. The article admits that this would be a more expensive option. Which to me means "unlikely" or "unsustainable".

FIAT boss says *1 million* cars on a shared platform with GM would be 'minimum' for profit... yikes!

No wonder the car industry is on the nose. FIAT boss Marchionne said 1 million units a year built on a shared vehicle platform is the minimal scale required to be profitable. In other words the current platform sharing (for the uninitiated that means much of the structure if not the running gear is common between brands) is unprofitable, despite FIAT's recent turnaround. So to get to that required volume requires doing another deal with GM to share platforms in Europe, and then to bring the FIAT-Chrysler deal into the arrangement as well.

I do wonder how sustainable it is to manufacture 1,000,000 units of such an elaborately transformed good every year in order to simply turn a minimum profit. That's just one platform, remember, generating just a few models across a small number of brands. Now platform sharing is good, it's far better than each of the models being designed from scratch - but I think it's best not to think too hard about such numbers, too. When you think about all of the brands, and all of the models, and all of the resources consumed to make it happen... I just want to ride my bike instead.

While Aussie car makers stand still, Europe goes electric... #EV #Audi

It's an Audi, or an Audi on a VW platform (nothing new there). Most importantly it's an electric vehicle, and a prestige one at that... and it's real, and it's small. It's a 2+1, would you believe! And whilst it's offered with a range of motors, it's the electric one that'll steal the show. Whilst VW itself is banking on squeezing the last drops out of small, turbo-charged diesel and petrol motors, it obviously has a Plan B, too. If the US car makers (and their Aussie offshoots) don't wake up and smell the roses soon they'll miss the boat, let alone the mixed metaphor, completely.

A variety of engines will be offered, although the star of the show will be an electric powerplant. It incorporates lightweight lithium-polymer batteries and a punchy electric motor driving the front wheels. So the small, agile car will be ideal for city motoring, delivering 0-60mph in around 10 seconds. And with a full charge providing enough energy to travel up to 100 miles helped by regenerative braking, the plug-in machine will have real all-round ability.