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Top student technicians compete for $12 million in scholarships

Jimbo Paranada and Marc Paguirigan wore their leis made of lucky Hawaiian ti leaves, but it wasn't quite enough to give the Maui High School students the win in the 62nd-annual Ford/AAA Student Auto Skills national competition on June 14 at Ford World Headquarters in Dearborn, Mich. The Hawaiian duo finished second to the two-person team of Matthew Saunders and Drew Torrey from Vale High School in Vale, Ore. The Oregon pair won the title of "America's Best Student Auto Technicians," outscoring at field of state champions from all 50 states.

GM names Stracke to succeed Reilly as CEO of Opel/Vauxhall

General Motors on Thursday named global engineering chief Karl-Friedrich Stracke to replace Nick Reilly as CEO of its money-losing Opel/Vauxhall unit, effective April 1. Stracke will report to Reilly, 61, who continues as the head of GM's European operations and will be nominated to chair the Opel supervisory board. Stracke, a German native, has led GM's global vehicle engineering operations for the past 15 months.

Audi hosts student workshop in Design UNIverse

Audi has hosted a Design UNIverse event in Ingolstadt as part of its plan to support the next generation of automotive designers. 42 student designers from four European universities were challenged to create models of a futuristic Audi that embodies the idea of "Vorsprung Durch Technik" while working closely with designers and discussing trends and how to create emotional products. The students – from the Academy of Fine Arts and Design in Bratislava (Slovakia), Scuola Politecnica di Design in Milan (Italy), the Offenbach University of Art and Design (Germany) and the Royal College of Art London (Great Britain) – created 46 different models.