Daimler won’t have bigger stake in Aston Martin

Loss-making British Luxury brand, James Bond carmaker, Aston Martin reported its sixth consecutive annual loss but said its latest DB11 equipped with Mercedes electronic gadgets boosted sales in the end of 2016. Aston Marin Marque, which made a  £71.9m loss in 2016, £127.9m loss in 2015,  the fifth consecutive year the company has filed to make a profit,  faces escalating bills to keep its range of sports cars compliant with the latest emissions regulations, increasing its dependency on larger corporations to act as supplier for things like clean engines.

The luxury carmaker which has pushed the start button on a new £200m plant in Wales under the

“second-century” plan to build their first SUV at a new factory in Glamorgan. The investment in new factories and cars increased the product development spending by 40 per cent to £161m and drove the company into the red by £30.2m of impairments, £7.5m of restructuring costs. Andy Palmer CEO of Aston Martin announced it was cutting almost 300 jobs as part of the cost-cutting to run around the car maker.

Daimler, which owns Luxury brand Mercedes-Benz, struck a deal in 2013 to receive a 5 per cent stake in Aston Martin in exchange for supplying engines and electronic components, a deal which helps, the only luxury carmaker in the world at present not attached to a larger manufacturer, so that they can spread cost of developing new fuel-efficient vehicles.

Dieter Zetsche CEO of Daimler,  however, ruled out Mercedes taking a bigger stake in Aston Martin, “ I think just the way we are working together is the perfect way for both sides and we have no plan of changing that in the near future”.