Car Manufacturers - page 2

Continuing our feature about the major car manufacturers. This part of the article covers the fifth, sixth and seventh biggest worldwide manufactuers of automobiles, namely DaimlerChrysler, and Japan's Honda and Nissan.

The initial part of this article covered GM, Toyota, Ford and Volkswagen.

DaimlerChrysler, Peugeot Citroen, Honda & Nissan

Daimler Chrylser

Formed in 1998 by the merger "of equals" of Daimler-Benz of Germany and Chrysler of America, Daimler Chysler instantly became the fifth largest car manufacturer. For years after the companies got together, there was in fact much debate about the equality of the merger, with some arguing that in fact it was a takeover of Chrysler by Mercedes.

Chrysler was, and is, one of the biggest names of American Automotive history, and Daimler-Benz are of course the most important names in the history of the car, though the company's premier brand Mercedes is taken from the name of the daughter of one of the early directors of Daimler-Benz as the company had earlier sold the right to produce cars bearing the Daimler badge.

Peugeot Citroen

Peugeot Citroen was formed in the mid 70s when one of France's oldest car companies took over another. Citroen, were struggling at the time, having over extended themselves pursuing various revolutionary technologies, but the combination of the two businesses was a success. Temporarily there were setbacks when the concern also took over Chrysler Europe, but the difficulties that created were overcome and Peugeot Citroen has since produced some of its finest cars. The Peugeot 206 / Citroen Saxo was a huge success, and now both companies have a range of successful cars. Peugeot Citroen have also recently collaborated with FIAT of Italy on a joint venture, and even more recently with Toyota to produce a new city car in the 107, C1, Aygo.

Honda Motor Company

The Honda Motor Company has risen to 7th place in the table of motor manufacturers, though car manufacture is only one part of the Honda empire. For many years the company was more well known for the production of motorbikes than passenger cars, and today Honda produce everything from robots and boat engines to large vehicles, and has recently become very involved in the aeronautical industry.

Like both Toyota and Nissan, Honda's growth has been fueled by expansion of the company iteslf, with a small number of brands, rather than the takeover of other companies, and that growth has been built on the production of very reliable cars at competitive prices.

Nissan

Nissan, like the other Japanese manufacturers, has grown organically, and uses a small number of brand names. Although the company name Nissan hasn't changed, the major brand name for many years was Datsun but Nissan dropped the Datsun name in 1983 in favour of using the company's name on future products. Nissan's growth has been based on the phenominal success of its Micra car, plus a range of fantastic sports Coupes which have their roots in the 1970 240Z sports car. Today's 350Z continues the success of such models, and Nissan have little difficulty selling supplies of the car. When the 350Z was updated recently every single car was reserved by buyers within a few hours of the launch.

Nissan has worked with many of the major manufacturers in the past, having worked on cars with Ford and Toyota, and is currently in an alliance with Renault of France with the two companies currently both having the same CEO - Carlos Ghosn. There has also recently been talk of co-operation between Nissan, Renault and General Motors, though as of October 2006, it looks as if this may not progress further.

Other Information

Car Data

Here at the Car Club, we're attempting to build a database of car information. In the long term we hope to have everything from crash ratings to tyre pressures, including 0-60 times, CO2 ratings and any other piece of data you can imagine.

Information by: Hobbs