Several items crossing my desk in the past few weeks related to the auto industry if you are considering partnerships:
- Overall online automotive advertising will grow 27.5 percent over the next four years to $5.3 billion according to the Princeton research organization Kelsey Group;
- New demographic information from Scarborough Research shows who owns hybrid vehicles. The profile includes people who earn $100,000 or more (more than twice the national average) and are also more than twice as likely to have a college degree. Twenty seven percent even have post-graduate degrees. Nearly three in four are either Democrats or Independents and most vote in elections;
- J.D. Power is out with its 2007 Customer Retention Study. Toyota leads the list at 64 percent versus an industry average of 49 percent;
- And talk about driving diversity, Malaysian car maker Proton is partnering with the Iranian and Turkish governments to produce an "Islamic car" globally. Features would include a compass to determine the direction of Mecca for prayers and compartments for storing The Quran and headscarves.
