One of the highlights of this week's Los Angeles auto show will be the diminutive smart two-seater, deliveries of which start in around six weeks time.
The cute smart fortwo has been on sale for several years in Europe but it's taken the commitment of Michigan's own leading entrepreneur, Roger Penske, to bring the Daimler AG microcar to American hands.
As with all his business activities, Penske is intimately involved in setting up the U.S. distribution network for smart. The 70-year-old magnate (whose dealer group last year sold more than 180,000 new vehicles and generated $11.2 billion in revenues) reaches for his Blackberry cell phone when asked about smart pre-sales action. "Do you know that 53 percent of internet buyers for the smart want leather seats?" he notes.
The head of Bloomfield Hills-based smart USA, Penske knows from his phone exactly how many people have signed up online for the car and how they want to configure their vehicles.
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