MG's US plans in disarray?

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Source: 4car

Exports - and assembly - of MG sports cars is still intended in the US, despite the departure of Duke Hale, the CEO of the company planning the venture.

Oklahoma Global Motors, a joint venture with MG's owner Nanjing Automotive, was to assemble MG TF2 coupes from pre-fabricated kits in Ardmore, Oklahoma, and distribute them to dealers.

Hale has left along with two other senior executives, allegedly because his ambitious plan for sales of 100,000 cars a year by 2010, with a full-range model line-up and 350 dealers, had been much-reduced. There are reports that a range of just two MG-branded cars will be offered - probably the TF2 coupe and roadster - instead of a five-car range to include a hybrid, as promised.

Sources have also suggested that there could be problems getting these cars, which are based on very elderly designs, to meet America's federal safety and emissions legislation.

MG sources still say that production of 20,000 cars (over two to three years) is still on the cards for Ardmore, however, along with 20,000 made in Longbridge. European sales are still said to be scheduled for June, with US sales from summer 2008.
 
Yes, we are. MG/Rover was planning on coming over HERE?!?

Well, It'll make Dodge's stuff look good....
 
I can't say I'm completely surprised. Car and Driver had a pretty hilarious write-up on the whole situation in the newest issue. Apparently the new engines in the TF2 can spin up to 6800 CRPM (cultural revolutions per minute), and produces 28,275 BDARCORFP (brake disgraced anti-revolutionary cadres on re-education farm power). The sequential-shutoff injection gives each cylinder fuel according to its needs, and each cylinder generates power according to its abilities... And don't get them started on the Supplemental Active Restraint System (SARS).

...Best of all, the extra-tall rear-end ratio allows the TF2 to Trotsky all day at 80 MPH, but the car has a tendency towards Stalin in traffic. Thankfully, there is a great wall of torque avilable at low RPMs...

(Thanks C/D for the laugh!)
 
I thought that if anyone could crack the worlds toughest car market, MG could.
Who can I believe in now?
 
MG as a brand, along with Rover, just needs to be left to pass away gently in its sleep. Too much damage has been done to the name for it to ever really make a recovery and once again be the manufacturer it was in its prime - the early 60's.

R.I.P. MG (hope you get cremated this time)
 
Oh no! No more dreams of poorly made, 15 year old Hondas and two-seaters that the first Mazda Miata would laugh at? *Sob*
 
...And just like that, it was done...

Jalopnik
Plans to bring that most iconic of British sports car names back to the US market have fallen through once again, reports Automotive News. Nanjing, now Shanghai Automotive, has scrapped plans to both import MG-TFs from England and to build them in Oklahoma from knock-down kits shipped from China. British website Austin Rover Online quotes Gary Hagen, marketing director for MG, as saying, "The U.S.A. isn't on the short-term radar as an anticipated market for us. Regarding the Oklahoma plant, Hagen simply said, "The deal fell through." Yep, head to K-Mart for a quart of Bondo, 'cause that B is gonna have to get you through another decade.

The lack of US market plans hasn't stopped MG from moving forward, however, as the reopened British factory in Longbridge began turning out new MG-TFs this week in preparation for a 500-unit production run. MG claims to have plans to replace the TF with a new roadster and add a couple more models in the near future. As long as the deal doesn't, you know, "fall through."
Click to expand...

It isn't much of a surprise. Given that MG was taking far too long, combined with the fact that the car would likely not have much to give in an already competitive market, its a good case for nevergonnahappen.com. Oh well, we're still waiting on the French and those pesky Italians to come around too...
 
I think it's fair to say the Chinese are only making a half arsed attempt at producing any more MGs. There's no logic in doing so unless they go the whole hog and completely re-invent the brand.

It's just the usual buying up of manufacturing tooling and techniques they've been doing since time began.
 

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