Laura Soave to Head Fiat of North America

Laura Soave, former Volkswagen General Manager of Experimental Marketing, was named the Head of the Fiat Brand for North America. Soave has also worked at various positions with Ford, most recently as a Brand DNA Manager.

Soave will first introduce the Fiat 500 to North America. She will be solely responsible for all profits and losses of the North America brand. Her position has her answering directly to Sergio Marchionne, Chief Executive Officer of Chrysler Group.

-Anthony Alaniz

[Source: Chrysler]

Ralliart To Close

Ralliart, the motor sport division of Mitsubishi, has announced that is closing its doors as of April 2010. The company's closer, that has been closely tied to Mitsubishi, will not affect any current or future Ralliart Mitsubishi vehicles.

"Because of the sudden change of economy situation since the year before last, the business circumstances surrounding our company radically became worse and so, this time we have reached the conclusion that we Ralliart Inc., would scale down our business activities as of the end of March 2010," the company said in a statement.

-Anthony Alaniz
[Source: egmCarTech]