India? Jeep and Fiat – the rest are nowhere.

To save FCA Marchionne needs find a partner who will fix this problem for him. FCA doesn’t have the capital.

1. SUVs aren’t a bad idea big ones for the US are fine; they’ll need to do a better job than last time with the Aspen at making them a bit more special; proper competition for Buick. But they’ll need small and medium SUVs for China. They’ll need a few, they need them soon. One based on the Renegade and one on the new Compass; both slightly lengthened and with improved interiorswould go a long way.

2. A new 200, American’s still buy mid-sized sedans; not in the numbers they have in the past; but they’re still among the best selling vehicles in the US; Camry, Accord, Fusion, Altima, Malibu, Optima, Sonata. The old 200 looked good, but it needed to do more than that after the disaster that was the Sebring.

3. Imperial. Fiat, Dodge, RAM, Jeep, Chrysler, Alfa Romeo,_______, Maserati. I know it seems counter-intuitive to add another brand (they still have Lancia in Italy as well), but luxury is big business these days – Imperial can sell the Lincoln Continental/Cadillac Escalade rivals that Alfa Romeo and Maserati can’t, and they can sell them to China. It works like Borgward – a fresh brand but with a dash of history.

4. New engines. FCA has some very good engines small and large capacity engines – and a lot of duds in the middle. Their best engines, also tend to be confined to a single brand, Maserati will have to keep its exclusivity when it comes to power plants – but Fiat needs to start sharing it’s small capacity engines with the other brands (though they need the platforms to put them in – see No.1).

@Adam: ” Fiat’s continued loss of market share in Europe should be very troubling for him”. Please, take a look at this, just to give an example:

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/september-2016-fiat-chrysler-automobiles-sales-in-europe-597049691.html.

Now I understand where your freaky analysis about FCA strategy and position in the market come from: your wild but unsupported fantasy…

FCA is investing on Alfa Romeo, Maserati and Jeep, but Dodge will benefit from the investments on Alfa since they’ll have access to the Giorgio platform.
Chrysler will carry the FWD platforms of the group. I think Chrysler will survive if Marchionne gets the brand in the chinese market. Chrysler could be a great Buick competitor over there and that would ensure the survival of the brand.

As long as Jeep prints money, the Alfa Romeo launch is successful (early sales indicators show a jump in sales after the Giulia launch) and the Levante increases Maserati’s profits (it’s selling very well) they’ll get muscle and time to plan what to do with Chrysler.

As for electrification, FCA doesn’t have the capital to be a leader on that segment. they just have to wait for the battery manufacturers to ramp up production and adopt electrics when they replace their current platforms.
There’s no point for them in investing heavily in a market that won’t bring immediate profits. It’s better to let other manufacturers do the heavy lifting and then do agreements with suppliers like LG Chem or Panasonic for the batteries.

Part of the problem, I believe, is he looks at the brand as “FCA” and not the individual brands. Seperating Ram from Dodge was a desperate attampt to make FCA look more diversified. When, in reality, Jeep and Dodge were the only brands that held actual value. Fiat’s continued loss of market share in Europe should be very troubling for him. And Chrysler serves no purpose, beyond a minivan(not exactly a growing segment)

The whole auto industry has concluded that alliances and collaborations are necessary for the industry. Marchionne seems to get credit for this but other auto makers are doing this to save on R&D, not just for rebadging cars. Rebadging cars has never been a sustainable business plan, GM went bankrupt this way. Yet, Marchionne, who keeps touting alliances seems to be the one learning the least from them. He keeps looking for more partners, but is left wondering why no car maker wants anything to do with him

I think Chrysler lacks sprit de corps. Executives do their job within expectations but they do not motivate subordinates. They can not put in everybody´s bloodstream love and committment for Chrysler.

Instead a worker at Daimler, Lexus or BMW have blood filled with brand and pride and their families feel proud too.

I had such high hopes for the 200. The looks were a bit bland but very pleasing to the eye. However, after renting one for a weekend, I decided that it didn’t seem competitive in the mid-size market. Aside from being too small, it seemed well thought out. My question was why didn’t Fiat-Chrysler fix the 200 and Dart instead of killing them off. The fact that they’re going to the great auto graveyard in the sky tells me that “fixing” the Dart and 200 would have taken major (expensive) work.

I guess the only way to maintain Chrysler brand is to hope for a White Knight such as Honda or Toyota comes along. Unfortunately they are probably only interested in Jeep and Ram.