Sunday 16 March 2014

top 5 car manufacturers: Top 5 car manufacturers

top 5 car manufacturers: Top 5 car manufacturers: TOYOTA   Toyota Motor Corporation   ( Japanese :   トヨタ自動車株式会社   Hepburn :   Toyota Jidōsha  KK ? ,   IPA:  [toꜜjota] ,   / t ɔɪ ˈ oʊ t ...

Mercedes Benz

MERCEDES BENZ

Mercedes-Benz (German pronunciation: [mɛʁˈt͡seːdəs ˈbɛnt͡s]) is a German automobile manufacturer, a multinational division of the German manufacturer Daimler AG. The brand is used for luxury automobiles, buses, coaches, and trucks. Mercedes-Benz is headquartered in Stuttgart,Baden-WürttembergGermany.
The name first appeared in 1926 under Daimler-Benz but traces its origins to Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft's 1901 Mercedes and to Karl Benz's 1886Benz Patent Motorwagen, which is widely regarded as the first automobile. Mercedes-Benz's slogan is "Das Beste oder nichts" (English: "The best or nothing"). Mercedes-Benz is part of the "German Big 3" luxury automakers, along with Audi and BMW, which are the best selling luxury automakers in the world.

HISTORY
Mercedes-Benz traces its origins to Karl Benz's creation of the first petrol-powered car, the Benz Patent Motorwagen, financed by Bertha Benz and patented in January 1886, and Gottlieb Daimler and engineer Wilhelm Maybach's conversion of a stagecoach by the addition of a petrol engine later that year. TheMercedes automobile was first marketed in 1901 by Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft. The first Mercedes-Benz brand name vehicles were produced in 1926, following the merger of Karl Benz's and Gottlieb Daimler's companies into the Daimler-Benz company. Throughout the 1930s, Mercedes-Benz produced the770 model, a car that was popular during Germany's Nazi period. Adolf Hitler was known to have driven these cars during his time in power, with bulletproofwindshields. Most of the surviving models have been sold at auctions to private buyers. One of them is currently on display at the War Museum in Ottawa,Ontario. Mercedes-Benz has introduced many technological and safety innovations that later became common in other vehicles. Mercedes-Benz is one of the best known and established automotive brands in the world, and is also one of the world's oldest automotive brand still in existence today in 2014, having produced the first petrol-powered car.

Top 5 car manufacturers

TOYOTA

 Toyota Motor Corporation (Japanese: トヨタ自動車株式会社 Hepburn: Toyota Jidōsha KK?, IPA: [toꜜjota], /tɔɪˈtə/) is a Japanese automotivemanufacturer headquartered in Toyota, Aichi, Japan. In 2013 the multinational corporation consisted of 333,498 employees worldwide and, as of January 2014, is the fourteenth-largest company in the world by revenue. Toyota was the largest automobile manufacturer in 2012 (by production). In July of that year, the company reported the production of its 200-millionth vehicle. Toyota is the world's first automobile manufacturer to produce more than 10 million vehicles per year. It did so in 2012 according to OICA, and in 2013 according to company data.As of November 2013, Toyota was the largest listed company in Japan by market capitalization (worth more than twice as much as #2-rankedSoftBank) and by revenue.
The company was founded by Kiichiro Toyoda in 1937 as a spinoff from his father's company Toyota Industries to create automobiles. Three years earlier, in 1934, while still a department of Toyota Industries, it created its first product, the Type A engine, and, in 1936, its first passenger car, the Toyota AA. Toyota Motor Corporation produces vehicles under 5 brands, including the Toyota brand, HinoLexusRanz, and Scion. It also holds a 51.2% stake in Daihatsu, a 16.66% stake in Fuji Heavy Industries, a 5.9% stake in Isuzu, and a 0.27% stake in Tesla, as well as joint-ventures with two in China (GAC Toyota and Sichuan FAW Toyota Motor), one in India (Toyota Kirloskar), one in the Czech Republic (TPCA), along with several "nonautomotive" companies. TMC is part of the Toyota Group, one of the largest conglomerates in the world.

GENERAL MOTORS
General Motors Company, commonly known as GM, is an American multinational corporation headquartered in DetroitMichigan that designs, manufactures, markets and distributes vehicles and vehicle parts and sells financial services. General Motors produces vehicles in 37 countries under ten brands, including ChevroletBuickGMCCadillacOpelHoldenVauxhallWulingBaojunJie FangUzDaewoo. General Motors holds a 20% stake in IMM, and a 96% stake in GM Korea. It also has a number of joint-ventures, including Shanghai GMSAIC-GM-Wuling andFAW-GM in China, GM-AvtoVAZ in Russia, Ghandhara Industries in Pakistan, GM UzbekistanGeneral Motors IndiaGeneral Motors Egypt, andIsuzu Truck South Africa. General Motors employs 212,000 people and does business in 157 countries. General Motors is divided into five business segments: GM North America (GMNA), GM Europe (GME), GM International Operations (GMIO), GM South America (GMSA), and GM Financial.
General Motors led global vehicle sales for 77 consecutive years from 1931 through 2007, longer than any other automaker, and is currently among the world's largest automakers by vehicle unit sales.
General Motors acts in most countries outside the USA via wholly owned subsidiaries, but operates in China through 10 joint ventures.[7]:pp.18, 96GM's OnStar subsidiary provides vehicle safety, security and information services.
In 2009, General Motors shed several brands, closing SaturnPontiac and Hummer, and emerged from a government-backed Chapter 11 reorganization. In 2010, GM made an initial public offering that was one of the world's top 5 largest IPOs to date and returned to profitability later that year.

VOLKSWAGEN
Volkswagen (VWGerman pronunciation: [ˈfɔlksˌvaːɡən]/ˈvks.wæɡ.ən/) is a German automobile manufacturer headquartered in WolfsburgLower SaxonyGermany. Volkswagen is the original and top-selling marque of the Volkswagen Group, the biggest German automaker and the second largest automaker in the world.
Volkswagen has three cars in the top 10 list of best-selling cars of all time compiled by the website 24/7 Wall St: the Volkswagen Golf, theVolkswagen Beetle, and the Volkswagen Passat. With these three cars, Volkswagen has the most cars of any automobile manufacturer in the list that are still being manufactured. Volkswagen ranks first in spending the most money of any automaker on research and development as of 2011.
Volkswagen means "people's car" in German. Its current slogan is Das Auto ("The Car").

FORD
The Ford Motor Company (also known as simply Ford) is an American multinational automaker headquartered in Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit. It was founded by Henry Ford and incorporated on June 16, 1903. The company sells automobiles and commercial vehicles under theFord brand and most luxury cars under the Lincoln brand. Ford also owns Brazilian SUV manufacturer, Troller, and performance car manufacturerFPV. In the past it has also produced tractors and automotive components. Ford owns a 2.1% stake in Mazda of Japan, a 15% stake in Aston Martin of the United Kingdom, and a 49% stake in Jiagling of China. It also has a number of joint-ventures, two in China (Changan Ford Mazda andFord Lio Ho), one in Thailand (AutoAlliance Thailand), one in Turkey (Ford Otosan), and one in Russia (Ford Sollers). It is listed on the New York Stock Exchange and is controlled by the Ford family, although they have minority ownership. It is described by Forbes as "the most important industrial company in the history of the United States."
Ford introduced methods for large-scale manufacturing of cars and large-scale management of an industrial workforce using elaborately engineered manufacturing sequences typified by moving assembly lines; by 1914 these methods were known around the world as Fordism. Ford's former UK subsidiaries Jaguar and Land Rover, acquired in 1989 and 2000 respectively, were sold to Tata Motors in March 2008. Ford owned the Swedish automaker Volvo from 1999 to 2010. In 2011, Ford discontinued the Mercury brand, under which it had marketed entry-level luxury cars in the United States, Canada, Mexico, and the Middle East since 1938.
Ford is the second-largest U.S.-based automaker and the fifth-largest in the world based on 2010 vehicle sales. At the end of 2010, Ford was the fifth largest automaker in Europe. Ford is the eighth-ranked overall American-based company in the 2010 Fortune 500 list, based on global revenues in 2009 of $118.3 billion. In 2008, Ford produced 5.532 million automobiles and employed about 213,000 employees at around 90 plants and facilities worldwide.
The company went public in 1956 but the Ford family, through special Class B shares, still retain 40 percent voting rights.

HONDA
Honda Motor Co., Ltd. (本田技研工業株式会社 Honda Giken Kōgyō KK?IPA: [hoɴda] ( )/ˈhɒndə/) is a Japanese publicmultinational corporation primarily known as a manufacturer of automobiles and motorcycles.Honda has been the world's largest motorcycle manufacturer since 1959, as well as the world's largest manufacturer of internal combustion engines measured by volume, producing more than 14 million internal combustion engines each year. Honda became the second-largest Japanese automobile manufacturer in 2001. Honda was the eighth largest automobile manufacturer in the world behindGeneral MotorsVolkswagen GroupToyotaHyundai Motor GroupFordNissan, and PSA in 2011.
Honda was the first Japanese automobile manufacturer to release a dedicated luxury brand, Acura, in 1986. Aside from their core automobile and motorcycle businesses, Honda also manufactures garden equipment, marine engines, personal watercraft and power generators, amongst others. Since 1986, Honda has been involved with artificial intelligence/robotics research and released their ASIMOrobot in 2000. They have also ventured into aerospace with the establishment of GE Honda Aero Engines in 2004 and the Honda HA-420 HondaJet, which began production in 2012. Honda has three joint-ventures in China(Honda ChinaDongfeng Honda, and Guangqi Honda).
In 2013, Honda invests about 5.7% (US$ 6.8 billion) of its revenues in research and development. Also in 2013, Honda became the first Japanese automaker to be a net exporter from the United States, exporting 108,705 Honda and Acura models while importing only 88,357.