Chinese students buy expensive cars, at the University of Dayton and elsewhere!

Hi folks -- Ed Garten sent this article along to me form the Bloomberg News. indeed, at the University of Dayton our Chinese students often drive very nice cars, usually far better than either the faculty or American students. I have seen them behind the wheel of Porsche Panameras and Cayennes, M-Bs, and Audis. It can be quite irritating, as foreign students often drive into faculty lot "B" just to drop as student off or pick them up. And, as we learned last year, these cars can be more than the students can handle, as two died in a crash on Mad River Road.  I understand that when talking in a group to a student advisor, they will argue as to "who drives the cheapest car!"

Chinese students at the University of Iowa began coming into Carousel Motors in Iowa City about three years ago to get theirMercedes and Audi luxury cars serviced. Finally, general manager Pat Lind started asking if they’d ever considered his dealership when they made their original purchase. No, the students told him. Back in China, they’d been told to buy their wheels in Chicago before heading to college.

So Lind began sponsoring the university’s Chinese student association, which sends information to incoming students in China before they arrive in the U.S. Sales to Chinese students doubled and now make up about 5 percent of the vehicles sold at the dealership, located about two miles from campus. “We became an advertiser,” Lind says, “and got our face in front of them.”

The number of students from China enrolled in U.S. colleges and universities reached 235,597 during the past academic year, more than triple the 64,757 enrolled in 2002-03, according to the Institute of International Education. These students often come from families that are better off than the typical American college student’s, says Sid Krommenhoek, a founder of Zinch, a consulting firm owned by textbook rental company Chegg that works with prospective Chinese students. Shelling out $50,000 for a high-end car is viewed as an affordable status symbol compared with back home, where such cars can cost two to three times as much because of hefty import duties.

Among Chinese student car buyers in the U.S. in the past two years, 32 percent paid cash

Zinch surveyed 25,000 Chinese students last year and found that 62 percent said they could afford to spend at least $40,000 each year on a college education. “Most schools are recruiting [Chinese] students for whom the difference between a $20,000 and a $40,000 education is a rounding error,” Krommenhoek says. “This is a very attractive demographic for foreign brands.”

Chinese students in the U.S. purchased about $15.5 billion in new and used vehicles in 2012 and 2013 through October, according to Art Spinella, president of CNW Marketing Research. His figures, based on car sales, student and family visa data, and other factors, include Chinese students attending high school, undergraduate, and graduate institutions in the U.S. A comparable group of American students purchased $4.7 billion in vehicles, CNW estimates.

The interest in autos among Chinese students in the U.S. shouldn’t be surprising. Teeming demand on the mainland has boosted global automakers’ profits in recent years. While China’s austerity measures slowed luxury sales somewhat in 2013, deliveries there of Audi—for many years China’s No. 1 luxury nameplate—increased this year through September by 23 percent, to 366,038. Only 114,411 Audis were sold in the U.S. during the same period.

A little more than half the vehicles bought by Chinese students in the U.S. during the 22-month period CNW studied were new, with an average purchase price of $52,796; and 32 percent of buyers paid cash. Those buying used vehicles paid about $36,500, and 58 percent used cash. About 40 percent of their U.S. counterparts purchased new vehicles, with an average price of $19,472, CNW says. And fewer than 5 percent of those buyers paid cash.

Lind’s Chinese student customers almost always pay with cash. “Many times they’ll come in here,” he says. “They’ll pick out the car and say, ‘OK, I’ve got to call my parents and tell them how much to wire over. I’ve only got $20,000 in my account and I need $50,000, so they’ll wire the difference.’ ”

Some dealerships, such as Mercedes-Benz of Eugene, in Oregon, have hired Mandarin-speaking sales staff to deal with the rush of Chinese students craving luxe rides. Steve Shaheen, general manager of Okemos Auto Collection, a BMW and Mercedes dealer near Michigan State University in East Lansing, says he’s seen his sales to Chinese students rise to as much as 15 percent of his total business, from zero five years ago. Chris Perantoni, sales manager at Royal on the Eastside, an Audi and Volkswagen dealership near Indiana University at Bloomington, trumpeted in his advertising that the store had a salesman who spoke Mandarin and Cantonese—until the staffer’s visa expired and he had to leave. “Him being bilingual definitely helped,” says Perantoni, who estimates that as much as 10 percent of his annual sales are now to Chinese students. “We’d love to have him back.”

A poem for car folks! Happy Holidays!

From Britain:

May the open road caress you, may each mile bestow a curve,
May the pavement be unbroken, may you never need to swerve.

May your route be clear of snow and ice, may your traction be supreme,
May your ample arse not prove too sparse for that road trip of your dreams.

May your brake light blaze with brilliance, may you never need to pass
May your next trip be the best one yet, may your tank stay full of gas.

As you tour whichever route you wish, be it mountains, coast or canyons
May your quest be blessed with the very best of reliable companions.

So please accept this wish from me, with peace and health abiding
May happiness dwell in your home, may good fortune plague your driving.

Santa behind the Wheel

Anti-Theft Deterrents and the Big GM SUVs

FROM  The Detroit News:

The parking lot at Simi Valley Chevrolet north of Los Angeles, Calif., is well lit and fenced. But one night in September, thieves disconnected the lights and broke into the back windows of 16 Chevrolet Suburbans and Tahoes at the dealership.

No alarms sounded. When it was all over, dealership General Manager Steve Gaines said he was left with more than $3,000 in repairs to each SUV.

“They just unclamped the third row seat and pushed them out the back window and off they went,” Gaines said.

GM’s popular big SUVs, including the Suburban, Tahoe and GMC Yukon and Yukon XL, control about three-quarters of the market, have high theft rates and are expensive to insure. Third-row seat and wheel thefts on the SUVs have become increasing problems across the country, from Texas to Detroit, as thieves take and sell parts.

To minimize the problem, the Detroit carmaker has added a suite of standard anti-theft features, and an enhanced optional security package for $395, to all its 2015 full-size utilities coming to showrooms early next year. New security features also are part of the 2015 Cadillac Escalade, also available in spring 2014.

“We’ve put a lot of technology into improving the security for our customers, everything from our glass breaking sensors in the quarter glass area to … interior movement sensors,” said Jeff Luke, GM executive chief engineer for GM’s global trucks.

Other automakers offer some anti-theft features, but GM’s Global Vehicle Security Lead, Bill Biondo, says GM’s package is the most “robust and significant theft deterrent package in the market.”

The 2015 Suburban and Tahoe will for the first time come equipped with a standard steering column lock, aimed to prevent a thief from being able to steer a vehicle out of a driveway without starting it, Biondo said. Steering column locks already come standard on the Yukon line.

A Smart Car Interior Motion Sensor

Better theft deterrents

Some changes are small, but will be big for customers such as better exterior lighting when customers approach the vehicle, enhanced theft deterrents in the navigation systems and bolted third-row seats that can’t easily be removed (second- and third-row seats will fold flat). The SUVs also have standard improvements to door locking systems, Biondo said, and for the first time will have side-milled keys that are a better deterrent to lock picking. Lock cylinders have been bolstered to make it harder to jimmy open a door.

GM also will offer a theft protection package that includes an interior motion sensor that sounds an alarm if movement is detected inside the vehicle. On GM’s current full-size SUVs, if someone breaks a window to steal a laptop, for example, the alarm doesn’t go off.

“Most alarms on 95 to 99 percent of the products in the U.S. today only sound based on the latches,” Biondo said. “You have to unlatch the door and the alarm will go off. If you break the window, the alarm will never go off.”

The new theft protection package also includes an inclination sensor that sounds an alarm if someone tries to tow the vehicle, Biondo said.

“Or, if they just wanted to jack up your car and steal your wheels and tires, it would go off also,” he said, adding the alarm sounds once the tire leaves the ground but can be disarmed by the owner for normal use or repair.

Rear glass breakage sensors that sound an alarm if broken on the rear quarter windows and lift gate window also are included in the special package. An enhanced lock cylinder and shields around the lock cylinder and lock rods to deter jimmying the lock, Biondo said.

“We talked to customers and they expressed a lot of interest in security,” he said. “And some customers perhaps based on where they live or where they frequent expressed the desire to be able to purchase additional security.”

The company hopes the new systems and technology will help lower insurance costs for owners of the SUVs as theft rates decline.

Kay Jarboe, product manager for GM’s full-size SUVs, said a GM engineer spent eight minutes trying to break into one of the new SUVs and couldn’t. She called the new SUVs “almost impossible to steal.”

Insurance premiums cut

Insurance companies typically provide Michigan drivers with discounts ranging between 15 percent and 20 percent off their comprehensive insurance coverage if the vehicles are equipped with anti-theft devices, said Lori Conarton, communications director of the Insurance Institute of Michigan.

Theft rates are just one factor that determines insurance rates. Conarton said drivers’ insurance premiums are impacted by the likelihood of a vehicle being stolen or damaged, plus the vehicle’s value at the time of a loss. She said insurers tend to look at trends ranging out three to five years such as losses from from vehicle thefts.

“If that trends down, then your rates will trend down,” she said.

And as theft rates fall, Biondo said it will provide value for customers.

On the Escalade, GM in 2010 added a standard steering column lock and theft rates on the Escalade have fallen by more than 50 percent over the past couple years, Biondo said.

IHS Automotive senior analyst Stephanie Brinley said GM’s SUVs have been stolen frequently because there are so many of them on the roads She said adding the new technologies should reduce theft rates over time.

“There’s a lot of them out there,” she said. “There’s a big market for spare parts. I think that’s why they tend to get targeted.”

GM says some of the anti-theft features it is adding to the SUVs have been available on cars in Europe since the mid- to-late 1990s. Biondo said it’s possible anti-theft packages will be included on more GM vehicles; The company has offered an optional security package on the Cadillac ATS since 2013 and added them for the 2014 Cadillac CTS and 2014 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray models.

From The Detroit News: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20131219/AUTO01/312190024#ixzz2o9mukVYy

Where Auto Technology is Going -- the Connected Automobile and the use of Apps -- Mercedes and Pebble Technology

Seamless Integration of Wearable Devices: Pebble Smartwatch

Comment -- what a funky looking watch! -- only a true nerd would be seen wearing this! Rolex, Breitling, Omega, Tag-Heuer, has nothing to worry about.

Intelligent connectivity: At CES Mercedes-Benz gives a glimpse of the future

• Mercedes-Benz announces strategic partnership with Pebble Technology
• Wearable device integration: enhanced vehicle diagnostic awareness and multisensory notifications

Stuttgart, Germany. Mercedes-Benz has announced a strategic partnership with Pebble Technology in the run-up to the 2014 International CES, the largest consumer electronics show in the world. These invaluable partnership gives Mercedes-Benz early access to some of the newest hardware and early releases of application programming interfaces (APIs) offered by the Silicon Valley-based company, allowing it to develop innovative integrated applications that pave the way for the future of in-vehicle use cases.

At its CES booth, Mercedes-Benz will demonstrate how an intelligently networked vehicle becomes a part of the "internet of things" - and what benefits this can have for the customer. For this proof of concept, the developers at Mercedes have reinvented the Digital DriveStyle app in order to allow it to communicate with Pebble smart watches.

Pebble: connect yourself to your car and never miss a beat

Pebble's smart watch acts as a "second screen" for your smartphone. This revolutionary wearable device unlocks some interesting features for the connected car. For example, when away from their vehicle, Mercedes-Benz drivers can review important vehicle information at a glance like fuel level, door-lock status, and vehicle location using their Pebble smart watch, even when they are outside the vehicle. When hopping into their car, the companion Pebble smart watch app magically transforms, alerting its driver to real-time hazards through V2V technology like accidents, road construction, or stalled vehicles by vibrating the watch.  On top of this, users pairing their Pebble smart watch can customize the three watch buttons to activate their favourite Digital DriveStyle features like reporting hazards, auto-routing, Siri activation, remote-controlling media, or quickly showing nearby traffic conditions.

At the heart of innovation: Mercedes-Benz in Silicon Valley

Mercedes-Benz recognized 20 years ago that not just IT history but also the future of the automobile was being written in Silicon Valley, and was the first ever automobile manufacturer to open its own research facility at the home of innovation. In addition to creativity and invention, Silicon Valley mainly stands out on account of its unique culture of collaboration, involving short distances, networking, innovation and informal meetings. The physical proximity to companies such as Google, Apple and Facebook, as well as small, creative start-ups, allows Mercedes-Benz to integrate innovations into its vehicles quickly and in close cooperation with its partners, as well as to keep pace with the world of consumer electronics in terms of development cycles. The newly announced strategic partnership with Pebble Technology is further example of this culture of collaboration.

The Mystique of the Automobile

Hi folks -- I am currently reading over a number of articles for inclusion in the syllabus for my spring, 2014 senior history seminar. I was reading over Rudi Volti's "A Century of Automobility," Technology & Culture, 37 (October, 1996), p.667, where I found this provocative paragraph:

"The early history of the automobile shows that its overwhelming commercial success was not exclusively due to the mobility it offered. Then, as now, cars provided privacy and a sense of power, two things that always have been in short supply in human societies. This trend was reinforced by subsequent technological developments, such as closed bodies and more powerful engines. Much of the appeal of the automobile stems from its ability to confer a measure of insulation from the outside world while providing at least the illusion of power.  The private automobile is a greedy creature that makes vast claims on space, resources, and the budgets of its owners; only a device that promised more than transportation could have been so successful."

The underlining is mine.

Do we want large vehicles that take up space and reflect power because we are large people here in the U.S.? For a time it was good nutrition -- now it is simply obesity!