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2009 Changan Ford Fiesta

53K views 48 replies 7 participants last post by  Ford2transit 
#1 ·
Ford Verve 4-Door Concept Debut in Guangzhou

Debuting at the 2007 Guangzhou International Motor Show today is the Ford Verve Concept 4 door notchback. Back in September we saw the Ford Verve Concept 2-door hatchback debut showing Ford's Kinetic design language and this latest B-segment sedan version is no different. The Verve as the basis of the next generation Fiesta is sporting a rear end closely resembling the new Mondeo as well as the sweeping feline headlamps. Based on the same Ford B2E platform as the new Mazda2 sedan which was also premiered in Guangzhou, this sedan notchback is expected to hit markets in late 2008. As previously reported, the Fiesta will be introduced to the American market for the first time in 5-door hatchback form, which will make its concept debut at Detroit in two months as well as nothcback with design changes to be kept at a minimum to retain its European charm.




 
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#4 · (Edited)
Nice looking car. Just so I understand, is this the car coming to the U.S.? You mentioned the Ford Fiesta coming to the U.S. in 5-door form. We're looking at around late '08 for this rig to sell in the U.S.?

I re-read your first post and the Verve shown will be a basis for the new Fiesta, so that makes sense. I like the platform and the angle of the car, swooping down towards the front from the back. The huge, wide-mouth grille needs to be gotten used to a bit, but it doesn't look bad at all. I think I could get used to it. Looks good.

If Ford could offer a better Warranty, closer to Hyundai/Kia and Mitsubishi's, I would take a look at it in about 5 years. :)

No, seriously, it looks much more enticing than their new Focus facelift and re-design.

And I see that the new Ford Fiesta will make it debut in Detroit in two months in hatchback and notchback form. I do like this new notchback and that one I will look at from the Detroit show in earnest in a couple of months. Thanks for the post on this!
 
#6 ·
Ford compact car Verve to be produced in Nanjing next year

Ford compact sedan Verve will be locally produced in Changan Ford’s Nanjing plant by the end of next year, and the model will go on sale in Chinese market in early 2009, Changan Ford top executive said.

The Verve concept, designed in Europe, competes in what the industry calls the 'B-Car' segment of the market, one that is popular overseas but is smaller than most compact cars sold in the U.S., the Associated Press said.

The dynamic Ford Verve Concept four-door notchback is a star of the fifth annual Guangzhou Auto Show. The fact that Ford staged the global debut of the four-door Verve Concept at Guangzhou Autoshow testifies the importance of Chinese market in Ford’s global plans.

"With this new four-door Verve Concept, the picture of Ford’s big plans for the small-car segment is becoming clearer,” said Phil Spender, Chief Operation Officer of Ford Motor (China) Ltd. “Our future small car is being developed as a global car. It will be designed in Europe, engineered in Germany and manufactured globally. These two Verve Concepts demonstrate how confident Ford is in its direction and its appeal to consumers here in China.”

"The company’s plant in Nanjing is expected to produce 50,000-80,000 vehicles next year. When Verve starts production in 2009, the Nanjing plant will reach its peak production capacity of 160,000 a year,” said Shen president of Changan Ford Mazda.

Changan Ford Mazda is expected to produce 225,000 this year, up 35 percent from one year earlier, Shen said. “But the Chongqing plant’s maximum capacity is only 250,000.”
source: Gasgoo.com
 
#8 ·
All-new Ford Fiesta is launched at Beijing auto show.

April 21, 2008 - Ford revealed its all-new global small car, the Ford Fiesta, as a vibrant five-door hatch on April 20 at the Beijing auto show. The new Ford Fiesta has been remodeled for a new generation of customers as the first major product of Ford's new global product development process.

As part of its plan to roll out models globally to cut development costs, Ford will distribute and deliver its five-door hatchback in Europe, Asia, South Africa, and the Americas in the next three years, the company said in a press release at the event in Beijing. The all-new Ford Fiesta is expected to hold its global appeal because of its dynamic features created by the bold "kinetic design." It has accentuated the carmaker's great strides in craftsmanship and quality while continuing Ford Fiesta's traditional strengths of practicality, agility and safety.

The five-door Fiesta brings out the most appealing elements of Verve Concept. The exterior body structure of the new Fiesta makes extensive use of ultra high-strength steels including boron steel and dual-phase steel, which imparts greater strength to the vehicle while reducing its weight. These steels are used particularly in safety critical areas, such as the A-pillar and B-pillar, part of the ultra-rigid "door ring" structure of the Fiesta body side.

Ford's acclaimed dynamics engineers responsible for fine-tuning the Focus and Mondeo model's driving dynamics have worked extensively to enhance Fiesta's ride comfort and isolate road, wind and power-train noise from the cabin, and to give the new model an impressively quiet driving quality for a small car.

The car was designed and developed in Europe. Its Chinese production will begin by the end of 2008 at Changan Ford Mazda Auto's plant in Nanjing that already started operations in September with an initial annual capacity of 160,000 cars.

In 2007, Ford Motor sold 216,324 units in China, a 30% year-on-year increase. Ford increased its sales during the first quarter of 2008 in China by 47% to 90,791 units thanks largely to the growing demand for its Focus compacts.

source: Gasgoo.com
 
#14 ·
China launch of New Fiesta delayed to early 2009.

October 28, 2008 - Chinese customers have been eagerly waiting for the launch of the locally made new Ford Fiesta after the 2009 Ford Focus made by Changan Ford Mazda hit the Chinese market on September 25. According to a sales executive of the joint venture, the new Ford Fiesta will hit the China market in early 2009, said xinhuanet.com today.

An industry analyst said that it is due to the current market slump that Changan Ford Mazda has decided to delay the launch of the long-awaited new compact sedan Ford Fiesta from late 2008 to early 2009. It is believed that a year-end release of new car models can lend little or no boost to their sales, because most of the newly launched models have been marked down soon after they went to the market.

In the French market, Europe Ford has recently announced the price of its new Fiesta models, which will sell for an equivalent of 120,000 ($17,570) to 140,000 yuan. The Chinese made new Ford Fiesta is expected to be available to local buyers at a lower price as of early next year. Its Chinese production was reported to begin in late 2008 at Changan Ford Mazda Auto's plant in Nanjing.

Affected by China's auto market slowdown, the sales of Changan Ford Mazda in 2008 hold little hope for optimism. In the first nine months, the joint venture saw its sales grow by a meager 6%, far the 58% as expected at the beginning of the year when the company set the yearly sales target at 192,000 units - a target that now seems an impossible mission.

One of the urgent problems for Changan Ford Masda to address and solve is how to make a breakthrough in the sluggish market segment of compact sedans by promoting its China-made but late-launched new Ford Fiesta as a heavyweight model.
 
#22 ·
Ford starts making Fiesta hatchback in Nanjing.

January 15, 2008 - Ford Motor started manufacturing the Fiesta subcompact car at a plant in the eastern Chinese city of Nanjing on Thursday, the Dow Jones Newswires reported, citing a company statement on Wednesday.

The Changan Ford Mazda Automobile Company's Nanjing plant will produce the five-door hatchback and four-door sedan versions of the new global Fiesta for the Chinese market and the vehicles will go on sale later in the first quarter, the company said.

The U.S. automaker has been touting Fiesta, its second-best selling vehicle behind the Ford Focus, as the first in 'a series of global cars.'

The latest version of the Fiesta debuted last year in Europe, with 61,000 cars sold so far, Ford said.

The Fiesta will go on sale in North America in early 2010 and will be produced at Ford's Cuautitlan Assembly Plant in Mexico. And also in that year, Ford and Mazda's joint-venture facility, Auto Alliance Thailand, in Rayong will begin producing the new Fiesta for other major Asian markets.

Car sales at Changan Ford Mazda, the joint venture between Ford, its affiliate Mazda Motor and China's Changan Automobile, fell 5.9% to 204,344 in 2008 as the economic slowdown hit Chinese demand for vehicles.
source: Gasgoo.com
 
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