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New fuel-economy labels will baffle buyers, survey says

A survey released this week suggests that revised fuel economy labels proposed by federal regulators will confuse many likely car buyers -- and will emphasize the wrong information. The branding strategy firm Siegel+Gale performed an independent online survey of 456 people over the age of 18 who intended to buy a car in the next three years. Founder Alan Siegel told Automotive News that the survey was not directly requested but has been sent to the EPA and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration during the ongoing public comment period.

Jeff Koons creates 17th BMW Art Car

Jeff Koons has unveiled his latest creation the 17th BMW Art Car, a M3 GT2 racecar painted in a vibrant explosion of colors that will race at Le Mans on 12 June. "I wanted to make visual the raw dynamism, the power and the vitality of this car," he told CDN at the Centre Pompidou in Paris last week. "The car's biological narrative is to perform.

Official: Aston Martin gets its hands on Mercedes AMG engines & Electronic Architecture

Aston Martin & AMG confirm they’re getting in bed together Back in December we reported that Aston Martin had new investment from Investindustrial and wondered if that would mean – thanks to an existing relationship between Investindustrial and AMG – if we’d see Aston Martin finally getting access to AMG’s engines and platforms. By May, things had moved on and it was clear that Aston Martin and AMG were in talks for Aston Martin to get access to their engines for the next generation of AML’s cars. Now those talks have borne fruit and AMG and AML have signed a letter of intent for Aston Martin to “access significant Mercedes-AMG GmbH and Mercedes-Benz Cars’ resources, allowing the development of bespoke V8 powertrains and the use of certain components of electric/electronic (e/e) architecture.” Interestingly, there’s no talk of V12 engines – which could mean Aston Martin are going to move from the current Ford V12 for the DB9 and Vanquish to a powerful V8 from AMG – and nor is there talk of sharing platforms.