German humor, as is quite often pointed out, is no laughing matter. Which is precisely what makes this sendoff to Dieter Zetsche, who on Wednesday stepped down from his position as CEO of Daimler, so funny. In a BMW ad called “retirement is about exploring your wide open future,” Zetsche [actually an actor dressed to look like him]... BMW posts a smart sendoff for longtime Mercedes chief
German humor, as is quite often pointed out, is no laughing matter. Which is precisely what makes this sendoff to Dieter Zetsche, who on Wednesday stepped down from his position as CEO of Daimler, so funny. In a BMW ad called “retirement is about exploring your wide open future,” Zetsche [actually an actor dressed to look like him]... 
European prosecutors charged German automakers Volkswagen, Daimler, and BMW with collusion over emissions shortfalls. Fiat Chrysler will pay Tesla hundreds of millions of euros to meet emissions targets. The 2020 Ford Explorer will get a plug-in hybrid version in Europe. And Karma revealed a few details of its revised Revero for 2020. All this and... 
![Exhaust emissions from tailpipe [photo: Simone Ramella, 2005, used under Creative Commons 2.0]](https://images.hgmsites.net/tmb/exhaust-emissions-from-tailpipe-photo-simone-ramella-2005-used-under-creative-commons-2-0_100644014_t.gif)
The Mueller report may not show collusion between Russia and President Trump's campaign, but European anti-trust regulators say they have found collusion among German automakers to avoid cleaning up tailpipe emissions. On Friday, anti-trust regulators for the European Union charged BMW, Daimler, and Volkswagen with colluding to block the... 
Audi plans to introduce four new plug-in hybrids at next week's Geneva auto show. A drive in the Nissan Leaf Plus reveals how far electric cars have come in nine years. Electric motorcycle maker Zero has a novel way to get faster charging and longer trips on an electric bike. And German prosecutors fined BMW for its diesel emissions—but it... 
Daimler, the parent company of Mercedes-Benz, last week revealed that it will be buying $23 billion in battery cells by 2030. What it didn’t fully reveal—its sources for those cells—says as much, if not more about a point of unease among German automakers. Battery packs—and specifically the cells inside—are the single... 
Investigators probing U.S. models of Mercedes-Benz sold with diesel engines have found software, possibly illegal under EPA rules, that helped them pass emission tests. Such software may be similar to that notoriously used in 580,000 vehicles sold by VW, Audi, and Porsche from 2009 through 2015 in what became the Volkswagen diesel emission... 
Daimler, parent company of Mercedes-Benz and Smart, also owns the Mitsubishi Fuso Truck and Bus Corporation—which it used last week to preview major shifts coming to its Daimler Trucks business. It all took place at the reveal of E-Fuso, a new sub-brand of Daimler's Fuso operation that will focus on electrified and electric trucks and buses... 
Mercedes-Benz has already laid out its plans for a portfolio of electric and electrified vehicles, and now parent company Daimler has announced further strategy refinements for Mercedes-Benz and its other brands. The Smart brand will become all-electric, it said, while its commercial truck operations will continue to add electrified powertrains to…
Daimler, the parent company of Mercedes-Benz, is expected to announce that it will invest up to $1 billion to build electric SUVs and batteries in and around its Alabama assembly plant. The plans, first reported reported Thursday in The Wall Street Journal (paywalled), represent a major expansion of electric-car manufacturing in the U.S. So far... 
The country of Norway has been among the most ardent in urging drivers to buy zero-emission vehicles, offering a friendly market in which automakers can launch new electric cars. In fact, Norway was the first nation to announce a ban on the sale of new vehicles powered by fossil fuels; it's due to take effect after 2025. Mercedes-Benz has chosen... 
Sometimes the competition among global automakers can seem like watching a professional sports league. Powerhouse teams—GM, Renault Nissan, Toyota, VW Group, the four largest global makers—compete against each other as well as against smaller, scrappier upstarts with devoted and loyal fan bases. They field varied lineups of players... ![Mercedes-Benz EQ electric car concept [photo: Axel Harries]](http://images.hgmsites.net/tmb/mercedes-benz-eq-electric-car-concept-photo-axel-harries_100597897_t.gif)
The first vehicle in history considered to be an automobile was the Benz Motorwagen of 1885. It was also the first vehicle from an automaker that has been around for the duration of the industry: we know it today as Mercedes-Benz. In other words, the company has been building cars for 132 years. DON'T MISS: Mercedes to launch 10 electric cars by... 
As Tesla regularly points out, the lithium-ion battery cells used in electric cars can also serve in home energy-storage units. Now, a Daimler company will go up against Tesla in that field under the branding of its most famous luxury-car make. Mercedes-Benz Energy announced yesterday that it is working with Vivint Solar to develop home... 
Large global automakers customarily pursue research into multiple types of technologies and future powertrains at the same time. Sometimes they pan out, sometimes they don't. German automakers have only really come around to devoting their efforts to plug-in electric cars in the last five or six years. DON'T MISS: Mercedes-Benz electric cars to...