Audi has been recognized to be the world’s leader in the 4WD premium segment. The German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA) conducted the study that determined that Audi built and sold the most 4WD premium vehicles. For 2009, Audi built 190,500 vehicles with quattro drive, representing one third of Audi vehicles. The award for the best selling SUV in its class goes to the Q5, with about 63,100 units sold during the first eight months of 2009. In a release, Peter Schwarzenbauer, Audi member of the board for marketing and sales, said that Audi fully intends to strengthen its position in the all-wheel-drive market even further in the future. To increase its market share, Audi has plans on hand that include the addition of the new Q3 and the expansion of the production for the Q5 to China .

Pricing for the 2010 FX model from the American branch of Nissan’s luxury car division, Infiniti, has finally been released. Interested persons may already view these cars at the US retailers. Several versions will be available on the market, namely the FX35 with rear-wheel drive and the FX35 and FX50 with all-wheel drive. The MSRPs for the three 2010 Infiniti FX models start from $42,400 for the FX35 RWD, followed by the $43,850 FX35 AWD version and $58,400 for the FX50 AWD model. Both the 390 horsepower 5.0-liter 32-valve DOHC V8 (FX50) and the 303 horsepower 3.5-liter 24-valve DOHC V6 (FX35) engines are mated with a standard 7-speed automatic transmission, double-wishbone front/multi-link rear suspension and large 4-wheel disc brakes.

Chrysler Group is reorganizing. For starters, it made a new brand named Ram for its trucks and it has named top designer Ralph Gilles to be the CEO of Dodge cars. There had been a setup revealed last June as Chrysler emerged from bankruptcy in an alliance with Fiat S.p.A. however, this new structure represents a subsequent overhaul. In a statement, Chrysler stated that Michael Accavitti, who had led the Dodge brand, has resigned to pursue other interests. In addition, Fred Diaz is now president and CEO of the Ram brand. Olivier Francois replaces Peter Fong as CEO of the Chrysler brand, after Fong “resigned for personal reasons.” Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne said that this reorganization “will allow [the company] to protect and develop the unique nature of the product offerings within the Dodge Brand.” Michael Manley continues as CEO of Jeep. Meanwhile, Gilles will continue to be responsible for Chrysler design and Francois will also retain his position as head of Fiat’s Lancia brand.

It seems that the United Kingdom release of FIFA 10, the latest football simulator from Electronic Arts, has managed to spark a small war between supermarkets interested in offering the game to customers and specialized videogame retail stores, which are alleging that prices for the game in the bigger chains are affecting their business might even threaten their existence.

It appears that retail behemoth Tesco is offering FIFA 10 for the price of 24.97 British Pounds, which is a significant reduction over the 49.99 price the game is usually sold for. Other supermarkets are offering the same title for 36.99.

Meanwhile, the smaller retailers specializing in selling videogames and accessories are offering it at prices ranging from 37.99 to 39.99 British Pounds. The difference might not seem enormous but the overall difference in size of sales and in purchasing powers between the two types of sellers might increase the impact of the price cut and lead some smaller companies off the market.

The Domino D3 Digital Radio Has Certified iPhone Docking and Last.fm Support. Revo just announced its latest toy, I mean gadget, namely the Domino D3. This is a new generation of connected digital radio devices that embed in the same casing multi-format radio reception, along with iPod and iPhone connectivity, audio streaming and access to a wide range of premium online music services, including Last.fm. Regarding design, the Domino D3 comes in a creamy white chassis that packs top notch technology in this range. The soft edges and smooth curves are only broken by the frontal grill, knobs and joystick. What do you mean by joystick? Yes, this multi-format digital radio with iPod docking has a really innovative (for a radio) joystick-based control system that enables the user to quickly and easily navigate around the various advanced features.

You know, there are so many gadgets being invented lately, so many technologies being introduced that one can but think why on Earth don't we see a lot more James Bond type gadgets out there? God knows there are people willing to purchase them! Speaking about such gadgets, you might want to take a look at what a certain company called IronKey has prepared for you, namely the Ironkey Enterprise Server 2.0, a very secure server from a maker known for its wacky devices. Remember the military defense USB memory stick? How about the self-destructing USB drive? Yup, all devices from the same company. As for the IronKey Enterprise Server, it is a highly-scalable solution that allows for users to manage Enterprise flash drives in a secure manner. The device is so secure that it can even be set up to lock or destroy the flash drive in case data is discovered to have leaked and the user is compromised.

Bing has been launched for less than four months now and Microsoft is already planning Bing 2.0. But until then the “1.0” version seems to be doing just fine. Whether it's because of the new features and overall improved search experience or the $100 million ad money Microsoft poured into an all-out marketing campaign, Bing seems to be somewhat of a success with three consecutive months of consistent growth, culminating with August when it reached 9.3 percent of the search market share according to data from comScore. The share is a 0.4 percent point increase over the previous month, when it managed to attract 8.9 percent of the searches, and an even bigger jump from June when it had only 8 percent of the market. The growth represents a 16 percent increase in market share since May, the month before Bing was launched. The new numbers are in line with previous data released by Nielsen, which pegged the revamped search engine at 10.7 percent of the search market.

Redmond-based software company Microsoft has recently added a new item on its acquisition list, the Interactive Supercomputing (ISC) company, which is focused on delivering parallel-computing solutions to desktop machines so as to enable end users to benefit from access to high-performance computing. According to the company, the purchase of ISC's technology assets should enable it to make further advancements into its work on parallel computing and high performance computing. Kyril Faeno, general manager, High Performance & Parallel Computing Technologies at Microsoft, stated in a blog post that a team of experts on parallel and high performance computing, led by Bill Blake, CEO of ISC, would join forces with Microsoft's team at the New England Research & Development Center in Cambridge, MA. According to Faeno, who seems to be quite enthusiastic about the new acquisition, the two teams should be able to work together to “greatly improve the capability, performance, and accessibility of parallel computing and HPC technologies.”

The web was abuzz yesterday with talk of a new Yahoo marketing campaign, which is all about "Y!ou." This campaign was formally announced today, and a new site dedicated to it has even been set up by the company at YouAndYahoo.com. Yahoo says it is the single-largest integrated marketing campaign for the company ever. Yahoo says it's asserting its place at the center of people's online lives, and has announced that the company has "realigned all aspects of its business around simplifying and enhancing the web experience." "Today the Web and your world are inseparable," said Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz. "Hundreds of millions of people use Yahoo to get the information they need, connect with friends and family, and be entertained. We are about creating online experiences people find meaningful, relevant, and fun."

Thin friends who eat a lot could put your waistline at risk, according to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research, which examines how other peoples' weight and food choices influence how much we eat. "Obesity is obviously a tremendous public health concern," write authors Brent McFerran, Darren W. Dahl (both University of British Columbia), Gavan J. Fitzsimons (Duke University), and Andrea C. Morales (Arizona State University). "We decided to investigate how someone's size and food choices could influence how much the people around them eat." The researchers recruited 210 college students to participate in a study that was ostensibly about movie watching. The participants were told they would be paired with another student taking place in the study. The other student was actually a member of the research team whose natural build was thin (size 0, 105 pounds). But at times this same researcher donned an "obesity prosthesis," which made her appear to be a size 16 and 180 pounds.

The past 12 months have been poor ones for the world of motorsport, with automakers pulling out of such diverse venues as Formula 1 and rally racing. But some events are bucking the trend, with competitions like the Formula DRIFT Championship showing no signs of slowing.

The latest hero car set to compete in the Formula DRIFT Championship, albeit in next year’s series, is the 2010 Chevrolet Camaro SS, which is being prepared by BR Racing by Luke Lonberger in partnership with Conrad Grunewald Racing.The car will feature Hankook Ventus R-S3 tires on custom Forgeline aluminum 3-piece wheels. Beefing up the handling will be a set of Eibach Multi-Pro-R2 two-way adjustable dampers and coilovers. Power will come from a GM Performance LS-A supercharged 6.2-liter V-8 engine with more than 600 horsepower sent to the rear wheels. All body work will be constructed with carbon-fiber from Seibon Carbon.

It seems AMD's Opteron Six-Core processor is really very sought out lately, with yet another company announcing a system based on AMD's platform. Get ready to be amazed by ZT System's 1226RA datacenter server, an energy efficient yet pretty powerful device. Combining the Six-Core AMD Opteron EE processor and AMD's latest chipset (SR5690) seems to be a killer combination for a lot of companies so let us take a closer look at this latest combination. But first a word from Bob Weisickle, ZT Systems’ chief technical officer: “ZT is pleased to work with AMD in supporting the launch of this new platform. This technology extends ZT’s ability to provide customers with solutions engineered to meet their unique performance and energy efficiency requirements, enabling data center managers to optimize their operational costs while keeping capital expenditures under control.”

A lawsuit seeking to identify a Gmail user who accidentally received confidential bank information must proceed in public. A bank's effort to prevent the disclosure of information about a data breach arising from an errant Gmail message has been rejected by a federal judge in San Jose, California. On Friday, Judge Ronald M. Whyte of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, acting on behalf of another judge, denied a motion by the Wyoming-based Rocky Mountain Bank to seal its lawsuit against Google. "An attempt by a bank to shield information about an unauthorized disclosure of confidential customer information until it can determine whether or not that information has been further disclosed and/or misused does not constitute a compelling reason that overrides the public's common law right of access to court filings," the judge said in his ruling.

Bloomberg Tradebook has launched a new "soft limits" feature for its algorithms that is aimed at increasing liquidity capture. This new feature enables many portfolio managers' instructions to be consistent with how the algorithm works, according to a release. Most algorithms work off the idea of a hard limit - a limit price that no execution can violate - rather than an average price limit. Therefore, if a trader has a hard limit of $9.25 and he or she buys stock at $9.00, the hard limit prevents executions above $9.40 even though with the $9.40 execution the combined average price on the total order may be below the $9.25 limit. Many portfolio managers want to own their "position" - or the average price of the whole order - below a certain price.