Author: Serkadis

Filed under: Aftermarket, Coupe, Performance, Geneva Motor Show, Mercedes-Benz

We have to admit that we were a little disappointed when we saw the Carlsson C25 in person. The finished product doesn’t seem to quite have the ultra-aggressive look of the original concept sketches. It could also be that we’re not huge fans of the silver, black and orange paint scheme, nor of the brown and orange interior. In Carlsson’s defense, the color combination was chosen by their customer, and we’d like to see another version in a solid color and a better choice of interior hues before we declare a verdict.

Even so, the C25 is an impressive beast. Under the hood is a Carlsson-built 6.0-liter twin-turbo V12 putting out 753 horsepower and 974 lb-ft of torque, good for a conservatively listed 3.7 second sprint to 100 km/h and a top speed of just under 220 mph. To also appeal to potential clients, Carlsson has made exclusivity a top priority, limiting production to just 25 units and selling only one example in each country where they’re available. As is proven by the car you see here, customers can choose from a near-limitless range of exterior and interior color combinations. Hit the jump for more details on the Carlsson C25 or browse through the gallery of live photos below.

Photos by Drew Phillips / Copyright (C)2010 Weblogs, Inc.

Continue reading Geneva 2010: Carlsson C25 is a 753-horsepower twin-turbo terror

Geneva 2010: Carlsson C25 is a 753-horsepower twin-turbo terror originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 04 Mar 2010 11:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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I always enjoy watching Adam’s videos – BC

To many technicians, it is very clear where the equity markets will reverse, and for those folks who don’t follow the technicals, this is a key reversal area in the S&P 500, the NASDAQ, and the Dow.

In my new short video I show you the exact levels that I think will reverse this market, if in fact it’s ever going to reverse to the downside.

Currently the major trend remains positive for all the indices and we would only become negative on the these markets should the key levels I show you  today, are broken.

As always our videos are free to watch and there are no registration requirements. I would really like to hear back from you with regards to your thoughts on this video.

Your comments are welcome on our blog.
All the best,

Adam Hewison
President, INO.com
Co-creator, MarketClub

Mary cares for her husband Peter as well as dealing with her own deteriorating health.  She has experienced difficulties getting funding to help care for Peter, but now uses direct payments to help employ personal assistants.

76-year-old Mary lives in Bristol with her husband Peter, 74. Peter has Parkinson’s and his health has deteriorated over recent years. Mary now spends most of her time caring for him, despite having arthritis and being partially sighted.

“Life is pretty hard,” she says. “At 5 am I get Peter out of bed and he has his bath.  Then I get his breakfast and feed him…this morning that took almost two hours.  I do the lunch, something simple, and give him his lunch, then sit down for an hour or two if I’m lucky. Then I make his tea, which takes a long time again, and get him ready for someone to come in at 7 pm to get him to bed.”

Although Mary and Peter don’t have a lot of savings, they don’t get any financial support for Peter’s care as he had a reasonable pension. Mary finds it frustrating that that the Independent Living Fund isn’t available to people over 65.  

“It’s insulting to say people don’t want to live independently because they’re over 65,” she says. “We are doing it all for nothing. I feel we are being punished because we worked hard all our lives and paid our dues.” 

She is also worried about losing her Disability Living Allowance, which would affect things like their Motability vehicle. Investigating other potential sources of funding is difficult as they are constantly being passed between health and social services assessments, Mary believes.

They were advised to get home care for Peter, but decided against it as they would have paid the full cost themselves. They also felt home care would mean living round the timetable dictated by an agency.

“We’re both very involved in trying be independent,” says Mary. “We didn’t want to be ‘done to’, we want people to help us to do what we want to do.  Because we’re old we’re not idiots.” 

Mary thinks professionals should respect the knowledge of carers. No-one knows Peter’s needs as well as she does, but she feels that this is not always appreciated.  She feels that professionals she deals with sometimes don’t understand what it is like to be a carer.

“You don’t know about the isolation and the worry unless you’re the one who does it,” she says.

Because Mary is disabled, she has been assessed as needing respite.  For the last five years has received a direct payment for her respite needs.  This helps to employ two personal assistants to care for Peter for a few hours each week, giving Mary a much-needed break.  But they still have to use their pension to pay for much of the support they need.

The personal assistants also take both Peter and Mary out, giving them more opportunities to do things together.  Because they have a continuing relationship with the same personal assistants, Peter is more at ease.   

“I am very into direct payments,” says Mary. She thinks more older people could benefit from using them. 

Their direct payment is managed by the West of England Centre for Inclusive Living (WECIL), a local Centre for Independent Living. Set up and run by disabled people, it runs the payroll for Mary’s personal assistants.

“I wouldn’t dream of doing it without WECIL,” she says. “They are very supportive. They know what they’re about.

“The advantages of direct payments are without any doubt the freedom it gives you.  It is that independence…I don’t want to be told what time Peter’s going to get up or have his lunch…it’s a choice, it’s completely different…we choose what we want.”

Is the euro doomed? One (unlikely) solution proposed by Charles Hugh Smith is to devolve the currency into two: Euro 1 and Euro 2. Mercantilist nations such as Germany and France would make up Euro 1, and the debt-and-asset-bubble-dependent consumer nations would utilize Euro 2.

We talk about the potential split of the euro, how China fits in with the euro’s demise, and other solutions in the video above!

Produced By: Kamelia Angelova & William Wei

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See Also:

• Why The Euro Might Devolve Into Two Currencies: Euro1 And Euro2
• Is The Euro Rebound Real This Time?
• Europe’s New Debt Solution: Create Their Own Ratings Agency That Only Gives Friendly Ratings

Greek demonstrators have taken over the Finance Ministry building in Athens and blocked streets in the city center in protest against the government’s plan to cut the deficit, according to media reports.

Bloomberg reports that this is just the beginning. More protests and strikes—including a three hour work stoppage by the main union for public workers, is set for tomorrow.

This mass resistance coming from government workers is likely to hurt efforts by Greek Prime Minister George Panandreou to convince European Union allies and investors that he can get his country’s budget under control. The Germans and the French are no doubt watching the events on the streets of Athens very closely.

Today’s takeover of the finance ministry building was organized by a union group aligned with the Greek Communist party. Other protestors have taken over the nearby General Accounting Office, Bloomberg reports. Yet another group is blocking a central road in downtown Athens.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• RBS: We’re Shorting The S&P While Going Long Greek Debt
• 15 Managers Whose Funds Will Be Whacked In A Greek Collapse
• Dick Bove Bashes Goldman Sachs For Getting Scared Out Of Market By Greek Debt Crisis

During Frances McCabe’s long and varied career in health and social care, many things have changed, including attempts to improve assessment processes.  She thinks that national assessment could provide many benefits, particularly to people with complex care needs, but that it may be difficult to deliver in practice.

Frances McCabe has worked in health and social care for over forty years. She first trained as a nurse in Coventry in the 1960s, before becoming a health visitor. She has also worked as a Social Services Inspector, a Senior Manager in Social Services, and as Chief Executive for Age Concern Camden and in a national team funded by the Department of health on care of older people. She is currently a trustee for Age Concern, Brighton, Hove and Portslade and lives in Brighton.

Integrating Assessments

Frances believes that assessment processes got better after the Community Care Act was introduced and saw joint assessment between health, housing and social care starting to happen in different local areas. She stresses how important this is for people who use services. 

“The whole idea is for people to have a single system to relate to, so their needs could be orchestrated or at least kept within an integrated approach,” she says.

As well as talking about the need to provide better links between different types of assessment happening within an authority, Frances also describes how assessment varied between different areas, because of resources. 

“Each local authority had to put in eligibility criteria,” she says. “150 local authorities all had something different. Not only that, they all approached it differently. Some tried to relate levels of need with the package of care you might get. Some tried to look at eligibility in relation to outcomes. Others had a mixture. Now, they’re already delivering very different services. So the starting point for a new system is already different.”

Towards National Assessment

For national assessment to work, Frances thinks it must be the same wherever you go and that building the link between national assessment and local delivery is the key challenge that must be faced. For Frances, the difficulty with this is that different areas have different needs, which must also be met. 

“If their community have said ‘we’ve got our local community around us, we don’t need so much day care, for instance, we can achieve the same in a different way’ – that’s all right,” she says.

“But if you have a national criteria and it is open to too much local interpretation, you’ve already lost it. You haven’t got national assessment any more”.

She suggests that the solution may lie in building the structure for assessment that enables the same rules to be followed wherever it happens. This will mean that local people, who understand the local situation, are able to link this with national rules for assessment. She promotes a ‘passport’ assessment and care plan for people with very complex needs to ensure they get consistent support wherever they live.

UPDATE: Via The Fly On The Wall:

TiVo says U.S Court ruling pave way for $300M settlement from Echostar TiVo offered the following statement today on the U.S. Court of Appeals Decision to [ruling] in lawsuit against EchoStar. “We are pleased that the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit fully affirmed the district court’s finding of contempt against EchoStar, including both the disablement and infringement provisions. Additionally, this ruling paves the way for TiVo to receive the approximately $300M in damages and contempt sanctions awarded to us for EchoStar’s continued infringement through July 1, 2009. We will also seek further damages and contempt sanctions for the period of continued infringement thereafter. We will continue our efforts to protect our intellectual property from further infringement.”

Owners of TiVo stock (TIVO) are jumping for joy today as the DVR manufacturer received a positive ruling in its patent infringement case against DISH Networks and EchoStar.

Shares are up $3.99 or 39.1% to $14.20 a share after the news. Check out the volume right when the news hit the wire.

A PDF of the court ruling is also below:

09-1374

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Steve Jobs: A Man Aggrieved
• Equities Close Way Up, Gold Falls Below The $1100 Mark
• U.S. Steel Unions Score Yet Another Huge Victory As China Slammed With New Steel Tariffs

Filed under: Performance, Geneva Motor Show, Europe, Hatchback, Fiat

Getting a lot from a little. That might as well be Abarth‘s official slogan, translated into Italian, of course, for that added dose of Mediterranean flair. Fiat‘s performance division manages, first of all, to construct an entire line-up of hot hatches based on two models. And what they turn them into are genuine giant slayers.

As we reported just last week in the run-up to this year’s Geneva Motor Show, the Abarth Punto Evo takes the recently revised Fiat hatchback as its basis, and upgrades it, first and foremost, with 1.6-liter turbocharged MultiAir four-bangers in either 165- or 178-horsepower guise. Add to that upgraded wheels, brakes, suspension, interior and body kit, and suddenly this scorpion-emblazoned hatchback – a decidedly more modern alternative to the 500 – packs a real sting.

For better or worse, though, while its much-loved retro stablemate may finally make it Stateside in the near future, no such plans are known for the Punto in any form, so enjoy the live photos from the show floor in the high-res gallery below and the details in the press release after the jump.

Photos by Noah Joseph / Copyright (C)2010 Weblogs, Inc.

Continue reading Geneva 2010: Abarth Punto Evo takes the next step

Geneva 2010: Abarth Punto Evo takes the next step originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 04 Mar 2010 11:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Google has been customizing search results for particular users for years now, gradually introducing new rules and filters. At this point, one in five Google searches will be specific to the user doing the search and will differ from the vanilla search results ranking. This may seem trivial but Google spends a lot of time and resources trying… (read more)

Over the past few years, I’ve talked many times about the merits of combining aluminum and water to create hydrogen. Researchers have been working on using aluminum both inside and outside the car for such hydrogen on demand production.

Some of these methods involve using either an aluminum alloy or aluminum, water and some other chemical or element to do the splitting. But according to physicist Priya Vashishta from USC plus researchers at Kumamato University in Japan, have come up with a computer model of how this works.

A clump of aluminum atoms, they are calling “superatoms” take on special properties to split water into hydrogen and oxygen on the fly easily and efficiently.

According to Science News, “Some regions of the superatom were hungry for electrons, while other regions wanted to give electrons away, the researchers found. As these sites began interacting with the surrounding water molecules, hydrogen atoms swiftly jumped from one oxygen partner to another, ultimately ending up on the aluminum superatom. After another series of complicated hydrogen bond switching events, a hydrogen atom then left the aluminum to join another hydrogen atom. The two hydrogen singletons were produced strategically close to one another, easing their ability to find each other and form a stable two-hydrogen molecule.”

The idea of using aluminum to split water has merit. Like I had stated before, this can be done either inside the vehicle or outside the vehicle, such as at the refueling pump or a local hydrogen production facility. The aluminum is also easily recyclable and since this is a chemical reaction, it is more efficient that using brute force electrolysis to pry apart the hydrogen and oxygen bonds in water.

But the computer modeling program that Priya Vashishta has developed still needs to be tested in the research lab to verify results. The outlook is promising so let’s stay tuned for this one.

Office: Acting in the Community Together (ACT), Carleton College and offices of Financial Aid and Student Activities at St. Olaf College
Date Open: April 1, 2010

Purpose of this Position:

Direct and manage both the Northfield Reads and Counts tutoring program in Northfield Public Schools and the work study program through community non-profit organizations for St. Olaf and Carleton. This is a .830 FTE position working 10 months of the year from mid-August until mid-June.

Responsibilities:

Manage the Northfield Reads and Counts Program

• Manage relationships with Northfield School District.Lead monthly site specialist meetings to facilitate tutoring placements within the schools. Collaborate with Northfield Community Services Division for after-school tutor programming. Partner with the Youth Coordinator from Community Services to provide strategic vision and direction for program, ensuring educational workshops and logistics are outlined for academic year. Attend Teacher Appreciation Breakfast at five schools with St. Olaf and Carleton Educational Studies departments.
• Manage placement of tutors. Develop and deliver annual tutor orientation and provide ongoing individual and small group orientation sessions. Receive and review tutoring needs from 5 schools; post positions and provide necessary information as students select tutor assignments. Develop and coordinate support systems to manage administrative aspects of the tutoring program.
• Develop programming to enhance and enrich students’ experiences within the program. Work with the Northfield Community Services Division to develop meaningful training opportunities to enhance tutors’ understanding of the Northfield system’s philosophical approach to education and hands-on training for tutoring in specific content areas. Partner with Healthy Community Initiative to support tutor training and to offer other educational opportunities related to youth issues.
• Gather feedback from teachers through semester evaluations and/or surveys to ensure that district needs are being met. Gather feedback from tutors through various means: on-going communications, required meetings, and evaluations/surveys.

Manage the work study in nonprofits component of the program

• Create new partnerships and maintain existing ones with local non-profit organizations. Reach out to community organizations to introduce the program. Collaborate with organizations to identify their needs and specific ways to fulfill them through the CBWS program. Introduce various work study position models to stimulate thinking about various ways to structure CBWS positions.
• Facilitate ongoing communication with sites through check-ins, site visits, and updates. Represent all ACT and St. Olaf department programs appropriately to ensure that community partner needs are being met.
• Introduce and orient students to the work-study program in nonprofits. Supervise all off-campus work study students, conduct periodic check-ins and advising with work-place issues that arise.
• Facilitate the learning and development of students working in nonprofit settings. Partner with Career Connections at St. Olaf and the Career Center at Carleton to facilitate workshops (2-4 per academic year), providing a forum for students to reflect on their community work experience and how it enhances their college experience and impacts personal and professional goals.
• Gather feedback from site supervisors and students using various forms of evaluation, including surveys, to ensure effectiveness of program.

Manage administrative and procedural components of the Community-Based Work Study Program

• Work in collaboration with the financial aid offices on both campuses to standardize and complete mandatory institutional forms and documents for program eligibility. Identify policy changes to enhance the program and work with financial aid to implement.
• Work with business/payroll offices on both campuses to review and administer policies relevant to CBWS payroll. Manage time sheet collection and reporting.
• Advise and guide students as to their roles and responsibilities as participants of the program.
• Implement new technology-based services/procedures as appropriate. Identify and develop improvements to the CBWS website, facilitating effective and efficient dispersal of information through attention to structure and content, and enhancing interest in the program through creative additions, such as students’ stories of off-campus work experiences.

Contribute to the goals of both the ACT Center at Carleton and the offices of Financial Aid and Student Activities at St. Olaf College

• Collaborate with staff at both campuses when appropriate.
• Participate in weekly staff meetings and annual retreats as appropriate.
• Act as liaison between ACT and St. Olaf.
• Attend professional development workshops and conferences both on and off-campus.
• Participate in community events related to ACT and service programs.

Minimum Qualifications

• Bachelors Degree in a related field
• Understanding of and commitment to liberal arts education and to the role of experiential learning in a liberal arts environment
• At least one year of significant experience with educational programming and/or community work
• Clear evidence of program planning and implementation
• Excellent individual and group interpersonal communication skills; well-developed written communication and oral presentation skills
• Strong organizational skills and detail-orientation
• Excellent time management skills; ability to prioritize multiple responsibilities
• Self-motivated and able to work independently
• Able to adapt to changing work environments; flexibility
• Willing to work as a member of a team

To apply, please submit an application please apply online through St. Olaf’s employment website, https://jobs.stolaf.edu.

Looking for an opportunity to connect with dynamic students from around the world? The Hesselbein Student Leadership Summit is a way to strengthen your leadership skills and apply those to real-world situations. Join us from July 10-13, 2010 and learn from distinguished mentors what it takes to excel as global leaders today. The academy covers the cost of registration, room, board, and provides $200 in travel assistance! Applications are available online at www.hesselbein.pitt.edu. Deadline is April 18, 2010. Don’t let this amazing opportunity pass you by.

JP Morgan released a report on the state of China’s labor market this morning and the results are clear: China is in trouble.

There’s a high demand for labor in China right now with the ridiculous amount of stimulus money being pumped into the real estate market.

As a result, labor is scarce and is becoming very expensive to acquire.
But if you thought this was just a short-term problem connected to real estate, better think again:

JPM: There is no doubt that the supply of surplus labor in rural China has been falling continuously during the past decade, shrunk by the strong expansion in the industrial sector and continued urbanization. In addition, as the government builds the social welfare system in rural areas, and as the steady increase in agricultural product prices and favorable agricultural policies raises the opportunity cost of working in the cities, wages of migrant workers have been following a steady upward trend, with monthly wage growth averaging 14.8% since 2000.

This, coupled with recent news that Jiangsu province, a major export hub in China, raised its minimum wage 13%, has increased market concerns that wage growth could fuel further inflation pressure and raise the risk of a upward spiral in headline inflation.

Imagine the effect of a 13% minimum wage hike here in the United States. Employers would be forced to undertake rapid cost cutting measures to keep their business afloat. The same goes for China. If these issues aren’t addressed in a quick and concise manner, China’s real estate bubble may pop quicker than expected.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• China’s Jiangsu Province Hikes Minimum Wage In Hopes Of Luring Back Freaked-Out Coastal Workers
• If Chanos Thinks China Is Dubai ‘Times One Thousand’, Then Who Will Be Their Abu Dhabi?
• Jamie Dimon: China Wants To Get Everything And Give Nothing

Some grim news on housing out of the NAR.

Analysts were expecting pending homes sales to fall 1%, instead…

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Home Depot Sees Housing Rebound Across All Regions
• FINALLY! Here’s Your Latest Snapshot Of The Housing Market
• David Rosenberg: Get Ready For The FHA To Go Completely Bust And The Housing Market To Take The Hit

Gizmodo, who leaked the first Project Pink photos, have done it again, arriving with new marketing material for the handset which confirms the Verizon link and suggest the handset will be released soon.

They note the handset rendered is the Turtle vertical slider, and looks the same as the render posted last year.  They confirm the Verizon link, and suggest the device may be jointly launched by Verizon and Microsoft.

They note also while the handset is tried very much to social networks, it is not an early Windows phone 7 series phone, and will not be able to run applications designed for that OS.

Not much more info is available, but the recency of the material suggests a launch pretty soon, possibly around CTIA.

Read more at Gizmodo here.

Filed under: Car Buying, Toyota

The intense media spotlight has been focused directly on Toyota as its recalls of over 8 million vehicles for acceleration-related issues has begun hitting the Japanese automaker where it hurts most. Toyota sales were down year over year in January and a similar story unfolded for the month of February.

Automotive News is reporting that a recent Consumer Reports survey of Toyota owners shows that the embattled automaker should expect more customers to jump ship in the short-term. The Japanese automaker was leading the industry in consideration as recently as December, as CR data shows that 70 percent of Toyota owners were planning on purchasing a new Toyota when it came time for a new vehicle. Just two months later and the number has dipped to 60 percent, dropping Toyota below Honda in overall consideration.

The negative Toyota press is no doubt hurting the automaker, but the news isn’t totally (and completely) bad. While Toyota dropped below Honda in owner loyalty, the Japanese automaker is still ahead of Chevrolet (52 percent loyalty) and Ford (51 percent loyalty). Toyota also fared better with customers 45 and over, as the demographic reportedly has remained loyal to the brand. Customers age 18 to 44, however, are more likely to switch to another brand.

While it looks like Toyota is doing a decent job of weathering the sales storm during its time in the media spotlight, consideration could possibly take another hit in March. CR surveyed Toyota customers prior to the three congressional hearings with the automaker.

[Source: Automotive News, sub. req. | Image: Philippe DeSmazes/AFP/Getty]

Consumer Reports says Toyota owner loyalty waning originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 04 Mar 2010 11:02:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Yet more indications that Apple no longer thinks it can really compete in the marketplace. After finally going on the offensive and suing HTC over its Google Android phone implementation, apparently Apple is pressuring music labels over how they deal with competitor Amazon when it comes to music downloads. Paperbag alerts us to the news that Apple is supposedly demanding labels not participate in Amazon’s successful MP3 Daily Deal promotion.

Sources say that iTunes representatives have been urging labels to rethink their participation in the Amazon promotion and that they have backed up those warnings by withdrawing marketing support for certain releases featured as Daily Deals.

In response, label executives at Capitol, Capitol Nashville and Jive recently opted against participating in Daily Deal promotions they had been considering for Corinne Bailey Rae’s “The Sea,” Lady Antebellum’s “Need You Now” and Ke$ha’s “Animal,” sources say.

Apple’s concern, apparently, is over Amazon scoring temporary exclusives for early sales. Given Apple’s dominance of the digital sales market, you could certainly see the FTC reading this as being an antitrust violation. It will be interesting to see if this effort comes back to haunt Apple.

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Our friends at PDA.PL have come across a pretty interesting bit of information regarding the Garmin-Asus Nuvifone M10.  The smartphone features a 5 megapixel camera, but unlike most high-end devices these days lack auto-focus.

If now appears however that this is not by accident, and that Garmin-Asus are in fact implementing a new technology  which means the vast majority of pictures will always be in focus.

The M10 uses EDOF, which is short for Extended Depth Of Focus.  This means the area that are in focus in any picture are greatly extended, and the need for auto-focus greatly diminished.

The benefits are thinner phones and no need to wait for the camera to focus.  Tests show anything beyond 20 cm always seem perfectly in focus, and means annoying issues like waiting for the camera to focus in poor light should be a thing of the past.

Read more about the technology in this excerpt from a research paper below:

In this paper we present an approach to obtain an extended Depth-of-Field (DoF) for cell phone miniature camera by jointly optimizing optical system and post-capture digital processing techniques. Using a computational imaging approach, we demonstrate how to increase, to a useful operating range, the effective DoF of a specifically designed fixed focus lens operating e.g. at f/2.8. This is achieved with a lens design where the longitudinal chromatic aberration has been increased. This increase is controlled so as to have, for any distance within the extended DoF, at least one colour channel of a RGB image which contains the in-focus scene information (e.g. high frequencies). By determining the sharpest colour (for each region in the digital image) and reflecting its sharpness on the others, we show that it is possible to get a sharp image for all colours through the merged DoF of the three of them.

If you have come away completely confused, rather have a look at some example pictures at PDA.Pl here.

Retailers saw better-than-expected numbers during February as economists worried that snowstorms in the Northeast and Midwest would dampen shopping activity.

Let’s take a look at how some of the most popular retailers did in February:

• Abercrombie & Fitch (ANF): SSS up 5% vs. Retail Metrics estimate down 6.7%.
• Macy’s (M): SSS up 3.7% vs. Retail Metrics estimate up 2%.
• Gap Inc. (GPS): SSS up 3% vs. Retail Metrics estimate up 1.5%.
• Limited Brands (LTD): SSS up 10% vs. Retail Metrics estimate up 9.3%.
• Aeropostale (ARO): SSS up 7% vs. Retail Metrics estimate up 4%.

As you can clearly see, Limited Brands KILLED it despite the snow storms. Perhaps consumers are finally ready to start spending again…

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Awesome Christmas Sales Means Retailers Don’t Need To Blame Snowstorms
• Check Out The Retail Home Run In December
• Are Luxury Retailers Stealthily Having An Awesome Christmas?

Speaking at the 2010 Geneva Motor Show, Aston Martin’s CEO Ulrich Bez said that he will stay on as the company’s CEO until 2016. Bez had been scheduled to step down as CEO in 2012, but shareholders have convinced him to stay on.

Aston Martin said it will commemorate Bez’s 10th year as Chief Executive of the company by unveiling the DBS UB-2010 edition, with a limited run of 40 DBS units comprising 20 Coupes and 20 Volantes.

Capitalising on the new Works Service Tailored competencies, each DBS UB-2010 has been specified personally by Dr. Bez and features a unique ‘Azurite Black’ paint finish, a metallic bronze leather with woven leather seat inserts and a ‘Cryptic Titan’ facia finish. Each car will get a ‘UB-2010’ sill plaques signed by Dr. Bez together with a final inspection plate after Dr. Bez has signed-off each of the 40 cars personally.

Prices will be confirmed at a later date.

– By: Omar Rana