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Aston Martin’s boss has exclusively revealed why the firm is considering building its new four-door Rapide model abroad.
Chief Executive, Dr Ulrich Bez, confirmed to Autocar that making the Rapide in Italy is one of the options being considered, and that sports car specialist Pininfarina is one of the potential third party production experts being considered.
“Many manufacturers already build models at specialist manufacturers like Karmann, Magna Steyr and Pininfarina, where they have top ...Read the full article

Can't understand anyone having an issue with this, in this day and age. When all said and done it boils down to economies of scale and given the cost of labour in the UK they obviously feel margins will be increased by going abroad.

Had this been a mass production model such as the Focus et al, I would probably have a slightly different view of this.

Only if they avoid Magna Steyr - no way anyone would buy a car from the people who make (and are losing) the X3.

 Karmann is neither here nor there, but do Pininfarina have the production capability to make this in the sort of numbers that Aston might want? They designers after all, not a factory.

Jon Hardcastle:

Can't understand anyone having an issue with this, in this day and age. When all said and done it boils down to economies of scale and given the cost of labour in the UK they obviously feel margins will be increased by going abroad.

Had this been a mass production model such as the Focus et al, I would probably have a slightly different view of this.

yes, but you'll get all those "british industry" views from those that were posting on the whole Rover issue. 

britain is actually still very good at car making, be it small volume sports cars or mass market cars like hondas in swindon.

economics have a way of working things out i reckon. painful though the corrections are...

I agree, the UK has a thriving car industry, it's just owned by other people! But people have to get over this nationalistic clap trap, the world is a small place, and sometimes others do it better than we do or are just better at recognising and adapting to change.

What annoys me is not the "British" thing but that the government makes it so difficult to manufacture in this country now.  The whole nanny state with its health and safety risk assessment everything is what pushes up the costs, plus they tax you to the hilt.

Moving production abroad is a perfectly reasonable business decision in the current climate.

The reason Honda and Nissan can get away with it was to avoid the crippling taxes imposed on their products that would otherwise have to be imported which were put in place in order to protect our car industry in the first place!  The irony is staggering.

Jon Hardcastle:

But people have to get over this nationalistic clap trap, the world is a small place, and sometimes others do it better than we do or are just better at recognising and adapting to change.

 

hear hear!

Wow, we agree again. I may become your wingman, instead of Scummies.

Jon Hardcastle:

Wow, we agree again. I may become your wingman, instead of Scummies.

 

i love BMWs

:p