Volt, Golf and Audi headline latest automobile news

If Maximum Bob looks all charged up, he's got good reason to be. Robert A. Lutz, the vice chairman of General Motors, not only conceived the idea for the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid, but has made it his mission to push it into production.

He's shown here out at the GM Proving Grounds, in Milford, Mich., after taking a fully running Volt prototype for a few laps. It's just a couple days since the automaker formally gave the program approval to go to market.

There are still plenty of skeptics who doubt the Chevy hybrid will be ready for production, as promised, sometime in 2010. The big question mark hangs over Volt's lithium-ion battery pack, which will not only have to deliver at least 40 miles per charge, but also prove to be robust and reliable enough to survive in the challenging automotive environment.

We'll see if Lutz still has that big smile on his face as the deadline draws near.

Like all German automakers, Volkswagen has a cost problem. Producing vehicles, like its globally-popular Golf, in Wolfsburg is a costly process, thanks to high salaries and benefits. But even when the Golf is assembled in other locations, such as China, the popular model is saddled with designed-in cost penalties that make it increasingly difficult for VW to compete with its U.S., European and Asian rivals.

As a result, the automaker has embarked on a campaign to strip about $1,600 in costs out of the next-generation model, according to published reports. The sixth-generation Golf will make its formal debut for the 2009 model year. Among other moves, VW has decided to maintain the next version on the same platform used for the current Golf, which is sold in the U.S. under the Rabbit nameplate.

The Golf/Rabbit is critical to Volkswagen's global success. Last year, it produced 763,000 of the cars. And it could become even more important in the U.S., moving forward, since the German maker has set out ambitious growth targets in a market where it has been stalled, in recent years. VW plans to roughly double sales, to 800,000 by 2018.

To get there, the company is looking for ways to reign in prices, which tend to run higher than most competitive products, and to deliver potential customers designs and features better targeted to American needs. Sourcing new components from suppliers outside the so-called Euro-zone will help, too. But VW is also planning to both expand imports from its low-cost Mexican assembly line and build an all-new production plant in the U.S., which will be capable of producing about 300,000 vehicles annually.

While the company intends to keep importing some models from Europe, it is looking for ways to minimize the impact of a weak dollar, probably by exporting American-made vehicles back to Europe.

OK. Full disclosure. I am in love with the new Audi A4. And I am quite frustrated that once again, the German maker has decided to delay a hot new product's U.S. launch for a year while European motorists get first crack.

The redone A4, the all-new A5, the striking R8 ... there are plenty of reasons to pay close attention to Audi, and that's exactly what's happening in much of the world. The latest sales numbers show the carmaker sold an impressive 426,200 cars and crossovers during the first five months of this year, an increase of 1.5 percent, which is no mean feat in today's climate.

"We are already ahead of schedule," declares Audi Chairman Rupert Stadler, and solidly on track to break the 1 million mark for all of 2008, the first time that would happen for Volkswagen AG's up-market subsidiary. Though there are plenty of headwinds threatening to slow the auto industry down, Audi has the advantage of having an array of new products, such as the A4, ramping up to full production in the coming months.

The picture's a positive one, virtually everywhere you look. Indeed, in many parts of Europe, the brand with the four rings is now outselling both Mercedes-Benz and BMW. Countering the generally downward trend among foreign brands, Audi continued gaining ground in Japan during the first five months of the year. In China, where the brand is celebrating its 20th anniversary, sales jumped 23.4 percent through May, total volume topping 50,000.

Among the rare exceptions, the U.S. is the bad news, sales slipping nearly three percent, to just under 37,000. OK, blame the phase-out of the old A4 if you wish, but even if you were to adjust the numbers, the U.S. would still be lagging the smaller Chinese market, and not even keeping up with the U.K., where sales so far have nipped the 50,000 mark.

For any number of reasons, Audi has consistently failed to connect with U.S. motorists. The pat response is to blame the unintended acceleration brouhaha, but that's more than 20 years in the past, never mind it was effectively disproven. Even Infiniti is outpacing the German maker here in the States.

What do motorists elsewhere know? They clearly recognize Audi's reputation for design, especially interior styling, where it is generally considered the benchmark. Products like the R8 and S5 stand up in terms of performance, as well.

Perhaps, once it finally arrives here, the new A4 will finally connect with those American luxury buyers. Initial reviews suggest it's among the best entries ever in the compact segment. We'll tell you more when we spend more time behind the wheel.