Meeting

Cash payments aren't the only kind of dividends that Daimler shareholders have come to expect as a fight broke out between investors at the company's annual general meeting in Berlin.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) will conduct a meeting in Washington, D.C. on May 18 with representatives from the auto and battery-making industries to talk about safety issues related to lithium-ion batteries used on battery-electric vehicles.

Rick Wagoner had good news to report at GM's shareholder meeting, held yesterday: progress is being made, and the company is on track to shed $2.2 billion in expenses this year. He also said that GM is still in talks with Proton, but that it's "more a possibility for us than a probability." What remain as hot button topics for the year are settling negotiations with the UAW and Delphi to get Delphi out of Chapter 11, and reducing healthcare costs, which amounted to $4.8 billion last year.

Bill Ford, Rick Wagoner and Tom LaSorda have been twiddling their thumbs since May waiting for the White House to confirm a date for the Detroit trio to meet with George Bush, the D.C. decider. Tentative times have come and gone, and as each one passed, the perception that the current administration cares little about the challenges facing domestic automakers continued to grow. In reality, those challenges that include health care costs and the price of imported raw materials like steel, just di

Speculation is further being fueled that a possible alliance between General Motors and Nissan/Renault could become a reality with news coming yesterday that Rick Wagoner, the embattled yet persistent CEO of GM, and Carlos Ghosn, the superstar CEO of Nissan and Renault, will meet in Detroit later this month to, you know, catch up on things.