Interesting to read this morning that Audi may need to sell Ducati. I haven't seen anything yet that corroborates this but if it is true, who is most likely to buy them?
Hero. Tata, TVS, and Mahindra have all bought plenty of European follies, so it's about time Hero had a go. They can afford it.
Pretty straight forward, to survive in the current world car market, financial and business advisors are telling the VW Group, it needs to reduce its debt burden. Ducati is a largely self financing, multi billion Euro, autonomous entity within the VW Group, the sale would offset many the group’s financial woes. The same could be said for each of the autonomous car brands in the group. As to the all conquering onslaught of the Chinese automotive industry, VW Group appears to have no answer. Andy
...at the moment https://www.reuters.com/world/afd-l...russian-ties-she-eyes-chancellery-2026-06-30/ whosayshistorydoesn'trepeatitself #justsaying
Ah the AfD want to provide enough income to Russia to ensure Putin is able to invade whoever he likes.
Lol, there is that way of looking at it, I was thinking more of the similarities between an Austrian Painter and a certain 1933 event. Greed and ambition V 2.1 if you will. It never ends well, either way, sadly.
At the moment and fopr the last ten years as it has ploughed billions into its own EVs & Rivian and got….. nowhere.
Rabbit holes be rabbit holes, they dig and dig and get nowhere, come back to the sunshine, one day, and utter the words, hydrogen. In the meantime, euroasia, vassel state, yada yada. Oops too late. To answer the op's question tho ... China obvs
Back to the Putin distraction for a moment. He wont invade any Nato country. Why do you think he is so freaked out by the idea of Ukraine joining Nato. Because he would get his arse kicked and he knows it.
Cause and effect & unintended consequences. Making Russia wealthy whilst it is run by a guy who openly says he wants to restore the empire and regularly demonstrates his willingness to use the military, is not without risk if you live in a nearby country...
It wasn't so very long ago that Russia signed a treaty to always defend Ukraine against all aggressors in return for their nuclear weapons.
The EU has varying additional tariffs on Chinese vehicles in a bid to assist VW et al which are, interestingly, based on "on the manufacturer's cooperation with an EU anti-subsidy probe." And of course any (Chinese) companies manufacturing within the EU will bypass these tariffs. The UK doesn't impose any additional tariffs which is a major reason it's such a target market for the 30 plus competing Chinese manufacturers. When all things are equal purchase price is more often than not the determining factor for a customer and the determining factor for that is an in country well oiled (sic) manufacturing supply chain, high production volumes and of course cheaper overheads & labour costs. An in depth article can be found here: https://rhg.com/research/why-are-chinese-evs-so-cheap/ Globalisation provides increased competition and lowering of prices which is great for the end user who can afford the products because it provides increased competition leading to lower of prices and better products. However it does have a number of downsides for developed economies including, the export of manufacturing with large multinationals minimizing their tax and increasing inequality by stagnation of low skilled wages & higher wages for skilled professionals. Our choice on what to buy doesn't only affect our wallet.
