What ZipCar's IPO means for car-sharing

Car-sharing company ZipCar is expected to hit the public markets afterward this week, after some fits and starts caused by anti-trust issues in Britain. It would have an preliminary market cap of approximately $618 million, were it to price its IPO at the high end of its future $14-$16 per share range.

To get a better sense of what this listing could mean for the burgeoning car-sharing market, I spent various time on the phone with Shelby Clark, founding CEO of Relay Rides, a Google Ventures-backed company that lets users "borrow" their neighbors' car (ZipCar owns its individual fleet).

Cars after Japan's quake: Toyota, Nissan, and Honda plan to restart production

Despite the huge difficulties the Japanese car industry is facing, analysts say automakers will be capable to recover in the year ahead.

Tokyo
As every car owner knows, it only takes one missing part to carry a car to a screeching halt. And the average car contains anyplace from 20,000 to 30,000 parts, many of which – even in American-made cars – come from Japan.

As disaster-hit Japanese automotive manufacturers and parts suppliers resist to resume operations, the global auto industry hasn't fairly come to a standstill, but it is suffering losses in production of hundreds of thousands of vehicles, amounting to billions of dollars.

We’ve already seen production at GM, Ford, Renault, and Peugeot being disrupt, says Christopher Richter, a Tokyo-based auto analyst for the Hong Kong-based CLSA investment group. The auto supply chain is a bit similar to a house of cards; and there are going to be some surprises popping up in the form of sudden shortages down the line.

Still, despite the enormous difficulties the industry is facing, analysts say automakers like Toyota, Nissan, and Honda will be capable to recover in the year ahead.

Beginner driver's fatal decision

Police are annoying to find out why four children made a fatal decision to go for an unsupervised drive that ended in disaster.

Two of them - a 15-year-old boy and a 11-year-old girl who were back-seat passengers - were killed when the car crashed at high speed into a power pole on the NSW Mid North Coast previous night.

Police say the car was being driven by a beginner driver - a 16-year-old girl who had taken a 2004-model Mazda 3 sedan out unverified.

The 16-year-old girl and her front seat traveler, a 15-year-old boy, were seriously injured. She is in an induced coma in Newcastle's John Hunter Hospital, and the boy was flown to The Children's Hospital at Westmead for crisis surgery.

Car crash investigators believe the girl might have tried to pass at least two cars at "very high speed".

"We don't know where they were going and what they were doing," higher Constable Jason Bentley of the Port Macquarie collide Unit said.

"[But] they were traveling at high speed and overtaking other cars ... and there were a lot of witnesses. She panicked as she was overtaking the cars and missing manage."

Kempsey freeway Patrol Sergeant Paul Dilley said police had set up a speed counter on North Street in West Kempsey where the accident occurred following complaints after a request from local MP and Nationals leader Andrew Stoner. North Street is a directly bitumen road with a speed limit of 70km/h.