Bangkok - General Motors Wednesday announced plans to invest 445 million dollars to build a new diesel engine plant in Thailand and to upgrade its existing vehicle assembly plant.

The diesel engine plant, GM's first in South-East Asia, is to be located in Rayong province, eastern Thailand, where the US automotive giant has been operating an assembly plant for the past eight years.

The new plant, scheduled to begin production in 2010, will produce more than 100,000 2.5-litre and 2.8-litre turbo-diesel engines annually.

Wolfsburg/Mumbai - Volkswagen has launched the Jetta on the

Munich - BMW is offering the 1-Series convertible with new options and giving the buyer the choice of two diesel engines for the 2009 model year, the car maker has announced.

The 118d motor has an output of 105 kW/143 hp with an average fuel consumption of 4.9 litres per 100 kilometres. Carbon dioxide emission is at 129 grammes per kilometre. The second diesel, the 123d, fitted with a twin-turbo unit has an output of 150 kW/205 hp with a consumption of 5.4 litres.

Cologne, Germany - Most gender differences in motoring habits have been confirmed in a survey conducted in Germany on the basis of 150,000 insurance policy holders.

The poll, conducted by the business consultancy Nafi on behalf of the Capital Investor finance weekly, confirmed most perceptions of men and women drivers.

Only 16 per cent of men allow friends to drive their car while the figure is about 25 per cent for women. Men prefer to take the wheel of a car that is in general more expensive than the vehicle owned by a woman.

Hamburg, Germany - The days of the huge SUVs such as the Hummer, Porsche Cayenne and Audi Q7 are numbered as high fuel prices and a bad eco-image are causing sales to plunge and comes as manufacturers are offering a better alternative in the compact SUV segment.

Hollywood stars such as Arnold Schwarzenegger and James Cameron were often seen driving the fuel-guzzling Hummer in the 1990s, making it the ultimate male status symbol in wealthy suburbia.

The trend toward full-sized SUVs then spread rapidly from the US to many European countries. In London, the Range Rover Sport was a favourite among the jet-set who did not have to worry about exorbitant parking fees, taxes or fuel prices.

Nuerburgring, Germany - Fiat has revived the Abarth name for its tuning division and the car maker is mooting plans to release several new sports models under the label after the sales launch of the tuned Fiat 500 and Grande Punto Abarth.

Speaking at the launch of the two models at the Nuerburgring race track in Germany, a Fiat spokesman said cars such as the 1951 Coupe Abarth had plenty of charm but that new sports cars would have to be economically viable.

There have been several reports that Fiat is negotiating with Lotus to use the aluminium chassis of the Elise generation to build a small light convertible with a Fiat engine.