From husky dogs on ice to hip-hop violinists, via pouting models and celebrity chefs, the car industry has been true to its attention-grabbing form at the Detroit auto show.
The 2007 event marks the 100th year that the fabled “Motor City” is playing host to a celebration of all that is hot, avant-garde and downright weird in the world of automobiles.
The centennial anniversary was not lost on Bill Ford, the executive chairperson of the most storied name in United States automaking, which has now fallen on hard times.
In 1907, at the first show, his great-grandfather Henry Ford revealed the plans for the Model T, the car that pioneered industrial mass production.
“We’ve had some challenging times lately, but my optimism for Ford Motor Company is unwavering,” Bill Ford said on Sunday during a product launch inside a 12 000-seat indoor arena featuring blue laser lights and deafening rock music.
If Ford Motor had the glitziest event at the Detroit show, the Mercedes-Benz arm of the DaimlerChrysler group had literally the coolest.
The luxury carmaker laid out an ice rink for Siberian husky dogs, dance skaters and hockey players to cavort around its all-wheel-drive cars and sports utility vehicles (SUVs).
DaimlerChrysler chairperson Dieter Zetsche — the quirky star of a series of US TV ads that cast him as “Dr Z” — was then on hand to welcome the winner of the hit TV show Dancing with the Stars, American football legend Emmitt Smith.
Another star turn came from British singer Seal, husband of German supermodel Heidi Klum, who crooned for Germany’s Audi.
TV chef Bobby Flay was on hand to help the loss-making Chrysler Group promote the idea of quality ingredients going into its new “recipe for success”.
Nuttin’ but Stringz, a pair of black New York rappers who are virtuosos on the violin, put on a blistering performance for the launch of a new Cadillac, a venerable badge owned by General Motors that GM says needs freshening up.
At a pre-show “Style” event on Saturday evening, the troubled GM laid on a constellation of US stars to promote its cutting-edge designs, including rapper Jay Z and glamour-model-turned-actress Carmen Electra.
“Detroit cars and Hollywood stars are two elements that help define American and world culture; bringing the two together is a natural,” said Mike Jackson, GM’s vice-president for North America.
In the age of iPod players and cellphones, the auto and technology worlds are also now in harness.
Ford Motor beamed in Microsoft chairperson Bill Gates via satellite from the Las Vegas electronics show, to present a new technology called “Sync” that will enable voice-activated phone and music operations in Ford cars.
Also on the avant-garde, Japanese parts maker Denso showed off a system that can wake up a drowsy driver with a blast of cold air and audible alarms, once its infrared eye monitor and heartbeat detector see the onset of sleep.
Lower down the tech scale, China’s Changfeng Group was confined to the basement of Detroit’s cavernous Cobo Centre to show its “Cheetah” SUVs and pickup trucks, which it hopes to sell in the US within two years.
On its promotional video, Changfeng declared: “Dragons are taking off and cheetahs are leaping forward.”
Ironically, the video was set to the music of Jerusalem, a stirring hymn in which the poet William Blake decries the “dark satanic mills” of 19th-century England that China is now emulating in its rapid industrialisation.
Ford was also missing an irony when it played music from British glam-rock band T Rex to introduce its new chief executive, Alan Mulally. The group’s lead singer, Marc Bolan, was killed in a car crash in 1977. — AFP