News watch Feb 2010: today's auto industry news

Tuesday 2 February 2010• Spyker has outlined its plans for Saab, which include a new 'all Saab' 9-3 to be launched in 2012. Read the full story here (Saab)• EuroNCAP has named the VW Golf as 'Safest Car of 2009' after ranking all the 33 models it crashed last year (Volkswagen) • Toyota's massive recall to fix fault accelerator pedals could cost the company £1.25bn in lost output and sales (BBC)• Ford will unveil an Edge SUV at next week's Chicago auto show with a turbocharged four-cylinder Ecoboost engine, but the extensive visual mid-life facelift has been made economically possible thanks to Ford's worldwide consolidation of its model ranges (Detroit News) • Toyota has denied that it ignored warnings and acted slowly over reports of unintended acceleration in its vehicles (Detroit News) Monday 1 February 2010• Lotus's vehicle engineering director Roger Becker announced his retirement today. Becker, 64, joined Lotus in 1966, worked alongside Colin Chapman and helped develop every single model since (Group Lotus)• Tata Motors' total sales last month hit 65,478 vehicles – a rise of 77% over January 2009.

Local Motors Texas Competition Results

Local Motors has announced the winners of the Texas Motor competition, the independent car company's 19th competition. Tasked with designing a vehicle that was a ready-made solution for sportsmen in the great state of Texas, entrants were asked to submit their creations via the Local Motors website. The winning design, selected by members of the Local Motors community, was created by Acatrinei Lucian Nicolae.

2013 SEAT Leon leaks out

The 2013 SEAT Leon – SEAT’s take on the new VW Golf and Audi A3 – has leaked out ahead of the official reveal. As has become the norm, we have photos of the 2013 SEAT Leon leaked out well ahead of its public debut at the Paris Motor Show in September and before SEAT has had a chance to delight us all directly. A very toned down version of the SEAT IBE Concept we saw at Geneva in 2010 and based on the VW group MQB platform that underpins the new VW Golf and Audi A3, the new SEAT Leon is the third generation of SEAT’s take on the Golf.