Fiat Still Committed to Chrysler

Tuesday, Italian automaker Fiat remained committed to gaining majority control over Chrysler, even with the recent Supreme Court stay on the sale. In the agreement, Fiat has the option to walk away from the deal if it is not completed by June 15. Three Indian pension and construction funds, which hold a portion of the remaining Chrysler debt, are claiming that the pending sale unfairly supports unsecured stakeholders vs. secured debt holders.

Amid the confusion and pending decisions from the Supreme Court, Fiat remains committed to Chrysler. “Fiat won’t walk away from Chrysler,” Fiat spokesman Gualberto Ranieri

The pending agreement allows Chrysler to have access to the environmentally-concious engine technologies and management expertise of Fiat, all for a 20 percent stake in the company.

Fiat will also bring the popular Fiat 500 and the Alfa Romeo brand to the U.S.

DrivePwr will continue report on the pending sale. Stay Tuned!

T.Boone Pickens, Smart Like a Fox

T. Boone Pickens is spending (or is it investing) 60 million of his fortune into pushing environmental responsibility and reduction on foreign oil as a matter of national defense. T.Boone is smart like a fox.  As a believer in our system that rewards initiative and talent with wealth, I think T.Boone and his advisers have come up with a slick marketing and business plan that will ultimately yield handsome returns on this investment. Before T.Boone was filling our airwaves with his message that we must shift our economy away from foreign oil, he was busy investing in natural gas and compressed natural gas technology.  He acquired the nation’s largest provider of natural gas for transportation, is a partner in a 160 million dollar project to develop a mass market CNG powered vehicle, and has invested heavily in wind energy companies.

Some environmentalists are piously claiming that T.Boone’s motivations are not pure and that he is pushing energy independence not as good citizen but rather as a greedy capitalist.  Others claim he has gone too far in pushing the political system in California to pass the now controversial Proposition 10 that supports a handful of green initiatives, but primarily gives tax incentives and rebates to buyers of natural gas based vehicles.

Is it really wrong for a company or individual to invest in marketing or lobbying that supports past  business decisions? T.Boone is sounding a resonant chord that has more than just a ring of truth and allows him to simultaneously raise the value of his personal investment in alternative energy.  Is it a brilliant financial move or is T.Boone, the national benefactor, unselfishly using his wealth to help clean our environment and move to energy independence?  In a market where alternative energy investment has been growing at a steady and growing 25% a year, we should all take a lesson that for this brief moment in history, a good capitalist can promote a clean environment and generate personal financial growth.

A step in the right direction for the UK?

In the early portions of World War II,  the U.S. government instituted whats now known as the Manhattan Project to combat the increasing threat of nuclear fission in the hands of Adolf Hitler.  So the question remains, how dire is our need to eliminate our dependence on foreign oils, and is it as crucial as the Manhattan Project? Some would argue, climate change is more dangerous than the threat of one crazed lunatic.

As the cost of oil and its impact on the environment and global economics becomes more evident and mainstream, we have watched private development and government initiatives come to light, and sometimes at the same time. So is this case with the “Low Carbon Vehicle Integrated Delivery Programme“, managed by The Technology Strategy Board as a 5 year program.  Funding begins in April of 2009, and will cover a variety of areas, including university based research and trialing and development options for low carbon vehicles.   As we watch countries like the U.K. invest over £100 Million in collaboration with private businesses, in what seems to be a near immediate source of funding, we can only hope that our U.S. government would at least MATCH the action the Brits have taken.

So (a little competition never hurt anyone) if we used the GDP as a guideline (the U.S. had a $13 trillion GDP in 2006, while UK was $1.93 Trillion), that would mean with a near 7:1 ratio, the U.S. should have… ohhh around $700 million dollars immediately available for research in lowering carbon emissions in the U.S, starting in APRIL. [click to continue…]