2011 Frankfurt Autoshow

2011 IAA- the Frankfurt Autoshow

View more presentations from Darryl Heron.

The 2011 IAA (Frankfurt Autoshow) is now open. I spent two days last week wondering around checking out what was new.  I decided to put together a presentaton of SlideShare (shown above), so that you can see more pictures and just to see if this can enhanse the experience of more traditional blog posts.

So Much to See...

While my presenation gives you quite a taste about the show, there is still so much more to see and experience, if you go there.  I took over 1000 pictures which I uploaded to three albums in Flickr, so you can see the vehicles from the presentation from various angles as well as seeing lots of other exciting vehicles that aren't pictured in the presenation. Most every automaker selling cars and trucks in Europe as well as several suppliers and aftermarket companies have presence at the autoshow.  There are high end luxary vehicles from Rolls Royce and Bentley.  There are the usual Italian suspects of Ferrari, Lamborghini, Masserati, Alfa Romeo, and Lancia.


Customization, Customization, Customization...

There is more and more vehicle customization.  Masonary, Techart, Hammon, and Alpine all offer a wide varitey of customizations for high end cars and trucks, while Brabus offers the ability to make your Smart standout without draining your bank account. Brabus had 3 new models on display including a Supercar, a hybrid, and all elecric vehicle. 


Hybrids and Electric Cars...

At the 2009 IAA, I was impressed by the number hybrids and electric vehicles on display.  This year there are way more of these types of vehilces avialable and more of them are actual production models that you can actully buy, so there is a lot of progress being made here.


Mobility and Social Media...

Many of the automakers are planning and doing some interesting things in the world of Mobility and Social Media.  In my experience Mobility was an effort by some automakers to make their vehicles more accessable for handicapted and people with disabilities, now the term is more about allowing customers the ability to have a mobile life style that includes doing all kinds of thing from inside and outside of your car.  There are more and more plans to use the cloud so that users can access their data at home, on the go, and now in your car.  More and more companies are seeing that they can gain more customers and keep them by offering more and more non-traditional services around cars and trucks.  Ford has the Evos on display, which is their social car and shows many of the things that Ford is currently working on in this space and many of the ideas and features are likely to make their way into production in the near future. When I talked to a woman at TomTom, she told me how TomTom developed an iPad app based on feedback and requests from TomTom users.  More and more TomTom devices are being sold as standard and otpional equipment with more and more models.  Some TomTom devices allow you to Tweet at various parts of your trip and to announce when you arrive. There will be more and more possibilities to interact with family and friends in ways that were only imgination a few years ago.


I had a blast at the Frankfurt Autoshow and could have spend several more days just looking around.  There are tons of interesting concept cars giving us a peak into the near future as well as lots of vintage cars and old timers which can be our window to the past.  Its too bad the autoshow is only every other year, so if you miss it this time you'll have to wait till 2013! I hope you get a chance to go and if not, why not check out my pictures on Flickr.

My Flickr albums can be found at...

2011 IAA Frankfurt
2011 IAA Frankfurt part 2
2011 IAA Frankfurt part 3


My post from the 2009 show can be found here.

The Detroit Autoshow And Social Media

Since it is January that must mean it is time for the Detroit area to break out of its winter freeze and Detroit Autoshow. The 2010 Detroit Autoshow (officially known as the North American International Auto Show or N.A.I.A.S.) is now under way at Cobo Hall in Detroit (2010 NAIAS). Alright, that is up to Mother nature to pull off that order (I do remember seeing plenty of snow going to the autoshow in the past). Every show is different with new trends emerging and this year is no different. Its exciting to see how Social Media is being embraced this year.




I attended the autoshow every year from 1997 through 2001 and always think that I'd like to go again this year. Last year I wrote about going green at the Detroit Autoshow and I attended the 2009 Frankfurt Autoshow. This year when I went to the N.A.I.A.S. website I was immediately struck that that they had links to Twitter and Facebook and I realized that auto industry is at least trying to catch up with Social Media.

You can now follow the N.A.I.A.S. on Twitter and you can become a fan on Facebook, so they're tweeting about the autoshow and putting updates in Facebook. When I last looked the had over 1,400 followers, they were listed 84 times and just under 4,000 people had become fans on Facebook. Mlive.com in addition to having their coverage of the event on their website, is also tweeting about it and allowing people to become fans at Facebook. They already have over 1,500 followers, have been listed 28 times, and have over 3,500 fans on Facebook.

Several months ago I discovered that Scott Monty, who is head of Social Media at Ford, has a popular blog where he talks about various things in the Social Media world. Scott Monty has over 26,000 followers on Twitter and he is listed over 2,000 times. He comes from Boston and moved to the Motor City when he was hired by Ford to run their Social Media efforts.

I've mentioned lists or listed a couple of times now and some of you might be wondering what I'm talking about? Twitter recently incorporating a listing functionality that allows you to group people into categories that you create, making it easier to follow the tweets of that group as opposed to looking at all the tweets of all the people that you're following. At the moment you're limited to creating 20 of your own lists, but you can subscribe to lists as well if you see that someone has created a list that you'd like to follow. Listing can be one way of determining how popular a tweeter is or a certain topic is. You might want to check out a post that I recently did on Twitter, where I described it further.

The 2010 Detroit Autoshow runs runs January 11th through the 24th. By the way they also have cars and trucks there.

Photo Credits: Skyline - Detroit, Michigan, U courtesy of LeoSynapse and A real lemon 5
courtesy of andrewatla.

2009 Frankfurt Autoshow

I had the pleasure of visiting the IAA 2009 (Frankfurt Autoshow) last week. The show runs through September 27th (visit the IAA website for details), if you'll be in the Frankfurt, Germany area in this time, it is worth a look. Even with lots of bad news in the auto industry for what seems like an eternity now, the show was a ray of hope with lots of exhibitors, some interesting concept vehicles, and an overall view the future that seems brighter than today's gloomy days. I took over 800 pictures, many of which I've uploaded to Flickr, and put them in set 1 and set 2.

BB1 concept from Peugeot is an electric vehicle.

Environmentally Friendly

Being green and environmentally friendly was a theme that was seen throughout the auto show. Most major manufacturers (and some minor ones too) seemed to have some kind of offering that was electric, hybrid, low emissions, or something that is a departure from the past. Toyota is on its third generation of the Prius (look for picture further down in this post) and they had a hybrid concept on display as well. Renault had several concepts on display including the Twizy Z.E. (Zero Emission) Concept pictured at the top of this post. Peugeot's BB1 concept is an electric vehicle (displayed further down). It is about the size of a Smart and can fit four. You might not want to take it on a long road trip, but would be handy for driving around cities where parking is hard to find. Fisker Automotive bills itself as the "World's First Luxury Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle". With a range of 480 kilometers between gas and electric power, you can actually drive somewhere. If you drive short distances their website contends that it drive less than 50 miles a day that it would be possible to average 100 mpg per year. The Karma S (displayed below as well as a charging unit immediately below it) is a very attractive car, not what you think of when you think of a hybrid. Smart had a few electric cars on display (I've posted one getting charged up below). Even Porsche is offering a hybrid version of its big Cayenne SUV (I've posted pictures of it at Flickr)!

Hybrid Karma from Fisker proves that hybrids don't have to be dull!

Here's a charing unit from Fisker

A plugged in Smart

The current Toyota Prius hybrid

A hybrid concept from Toyota

Customization: Make Your Vehicle Very Unique

Another trend that I couldn't help but notice this year was a wide variety of companies that do customization and some specialty manufactures. Weismann has several luxurious sports cars on display including the black M5F (shown below), which I thought could have been the batmobile! Brabus does all kinds of customization from Smarts to vans and everything in between. I was told that they recently sold a Smart for nearly 70,000 euros! I've displayed a couple of pictures of one of the Smarts that they had on display.
Mansory does high-end customization and had several cars on display including a pink Bentley (shown further down). I was told that there was a very limited production of the pink Bentleys and all of them were sold. Hamann had several vehicles of their high-end customizations on display (I've posted several pictures of them at Flickr).

The M5F from Weismann looks like it could be the batmobile

A highly customized Smart from Brabus

This interior is a lot more luxurious than your normal Smart!

Would you want to buy a pink Bentley?

Opel Lives

Here in the Frankfurt, Germany area there has been a lot of talk about Opel, with it's headquarters in Rüsselsheim it is a big part of the local economy, its future has been a topic of the local news very often in the last several months. Opel has been a big part of GM's European operations. Its car sales have been actually been pretty good the last couple of years. They introduced the Insignia, which received several automotive awards and accolades last year. I was looking forward to seeing the new Opel Astra and I wasn't disappointed. The Astra carries on much of what has been done with the Insigna but on a slightly smaller scale. While we don't know if and how the whole Magna thing will play out, Opel has another winner with the Astra (shown below).

The new Opel Astra

GM

GM, other than what was displayed for Opel and Saab, didn't have too much on display. They had a few Chevys but based on a strategic move a few years ago, Chevys in much of the world aren't American Chevys but more like their Koren cousins (I've posted some of these pictures at Flickr). Chrysler, Dodge, and Jeep all had some vehicles on display. Geiger Cars based out of Munich, sells American vehicles. They had several vehicles on display throughout the autoshow (including the Hummer H2 displayed below, with a price tag of over 170,000 euros!) Geiger had Corvettes, Mustangs, a Camaro, a Challenger, a couple of H2s and some others.

Hummer H2

Motorcycles Have A Strong Presence at the IAA

The Frankfurt Autoshow had a large representation of motorcycles. There were quite a few Harley Davisons on display (I've posted a picture of "Captain America" below). There were a few other displays including some three-wheels, atvs, and some real nice choppers (I've posted several more motorcycle pictures at Flickr).

Doesn't "Captain America" from Harley Davison make you want to go for a ride?

Mini Is Having a Birthday

Mini is celebrating its 50th birthday in grand style. They have an early Mini on display (posted at Flickr) and two nice concepts (both pictured below). In addition, they had several Minis with various customizations done (I've posted several pictures of the various Minis at Flickr).

One of two Mini concepts on display at the show

The second Mini concept on display at the show

Attention to Set Design

While the vehicles are the "stars" of all the autoshows, there has been more and more significance paid by the manufacturers over the years to sets and how their vehicles are displayed. I've seen some pretty impressive showcases in the past and there have been some pretty grand entrances by some of the vehicles being displayed. This year I'd give a best set award to Fiat for its colorful city background, that has a nice appearance as though colored by young children, helping to provide Fiat with a family feeling (a picture of part of Fiat set is shown below). Also, in the set area I was able to see some people painting the wall behind Mercedes vehicles displayed on the second floor of their exhibit (pictures of this have been posted at Flickr).

Part of the backdrop in the Fiat display

Nostalgia

There was a certain feeling of nostalgia at the Autoshow. Mercedes have some of its proud history on display as well as some of their past Smart brand history. Then there is the older Mini mentioned above. Opel had an old Cadet on display. I saw a really nice Coca Cola van and trailor that were probably going to be some kind of concession stand but that wasn't open to the public yet (pictured below).

Have a Coke and a smile (maybe a trip down memory lane as well)

Some Other Interesting Cars

Audi's R8 5.2 liter quattro looks like it could have been driven by the Terminator in T2 (Pictured below). Mercedez and AMG displayed the new SLS. There is something special about a Mercedez with gull-wing doors. Rolls Royce, Maybach, Jaguar, BMW and Land Rover all had some nice displays (you can find several pictures posted at Flickr).

The R8 5.2 liter quattro from Audi

The New SLS from Mercedes and AMG

I really had a blast at the show. There are some really interesting prototypes being displayed. The use of hybrids and customization makes you think that the auto manufacturers are looking towards the future. If you get a chance to check it out I think that you'll find it interesting. Be sure to check out the pictures that I've posted at Flicker (set 1 and set 2) it might take you a few minutes but it is the next best thing to being there! You can read about Going Green at the Detroit Autoshow here. If you liked this post, why not subscribe via your RSS reader or via email? You can also find me at Twitter, Facebook, StumbpleUpon, Flickr, and various other places online. Feel free to check out my other blog.

Going Green at the 2009 Detroit Autoshow

Mercedes-Benz S400 BlueHYBRID (english) - More amazing videos are a click away

The 2009 North American International Autoshow is underway. There are a lot more "greener" car offerings this time. If you happen to be in the Motor City between January 17th and 25th you can check them out for yourself. I've attended several of the Detroit shows in the past and always enjoyed seeing the prototypes and the new cars and trucks. I've highlighted the "greener" cars below.

• • Chevrolet Volt is an electric car from GM.
  
  
  
  
  
  • 2010 Toyota Prius- Total sales of hybrid vehicles at Toyota have already passed one million.
    
    
    
    
    
  • Mercedes-Benz S400 Blue Hybrid- here is an earlier write up about it at Hybridcarfreak. This is Mercedes first hybrid for sale.
    
    
    
    
    
  • Insight hybrid from Honda- This car is rumored to cost quite a bit less than the Prius from Toyota
    
    
    
    
    
  • Cadillac Converj electic car- read about it at autoblog and autobloggreen- although it is the similar to the Chevy Volt, it does look a lot different.
  
  
  
  
  
  • Chevrolet Spark- is a small car with more personality. You can read the network carshow writeup here.
  
  
  • Lincoln C- write up at edmunds insideline
  
  
  
  
  
  • Lexus HS250h- autoblog is calling it the king of the hybrids. Here is a write up at hybridcars.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  • Dodge Circuit- This is an exciting looking car, read more about it at road and track and autobloggreen
    
    
    
    
    
  • The environmental news network write up and here is a nice picture gallery of these green cars and some of the other vehicles being displayed at the dailynews.

It is encouraging to see so many "greener" cars being offered and there are some other exciting cars as well. I hope that you've enjoyed our stop at the 2009 NAIS.