Moscow - General Motors, the world's largest automaker, on Friday opened a 300-million-dollar factory, its first fully-owned venture in Russia.

GM joins five other foreign carmakers with plants in the outskirts of St Petersburg, an area coming to be known as the new Detroit of the automotive industry, as firms hope to compensate for slumping sales in Europe and North America.

Munich - German sports car manufacturer Porsche announced a huge jump in profits for the 2007/2008 financial year on Friday as Daimler AG and BMW reported a major slump in October sales.

Group profit before taxes in the 12 months up to the end of July soared to 8.57 billion euros (11.2 billion dollars) from 5.85 billion euros the previous year, Porsche said in a statement.

Washington - Ford Motor Co on Friday reported a third- quarter operating loss of 2.98 billion dollars and said it would cut jobs and spending to preserve its perilous cash reserves.

One of the US' "Big Three" automakers, Ford said it used up 7.7 billion dollars in cash as revenues plunged.

The losses reported by Ford, the second-largest US automaker, are likely to be reflected by General Motors Corp, which also reports its third-quarter results Friday.

New Delhi, Nov 7 : Audi, the German luxury car manufacturer launched its award-winning super sports car Audi R8 car in New Delhi on Friday.

The model, priced at 11.7 million rupees, is equipped with an engine displacement of 4,163cc, a power output of 309 kW (420 hp) at 7,800 rpm and a maximum torque 430 Nm between 4,500 and 6,000 rpm.

Munich  - Amid a continuing economic downturn, Germany luxury carmakers Daimler AG and BMW on Friday reported a major slump in sales for October.

Daimler said sales plunged 18.1 per cent to 93,900 vehicles compared to October 2007.

Sales of its core model Mercedes-Benz were down more than 20 per cent to 80,250 vehicles, while those of the subcompact Smart were up 11.3 per cent to 11,300.

The company said the biggest declines were in Western Europe and the United States.

Fearing a slowdown, Automobile Component Manufacturers Association (ACMA) has urged the government on formulating a 2-3 year "bridge policy" to enable the industry survive the current economic crises. ACMA stressed the government to provide some immediate relief to the auto-component industry to sustain their growth over the next few months to ensure that the momentum built over the last 5 years is continued to meet the vision of the AMP 2016.