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World Business Report: First broadcast 2017/01/09 18:32 GMT: Trump's Manufacturing Rebuild Puts Carmakers In Spotlight

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Trump's Manufacturing Rebuild Puts Carmakers In Spotlight

First broadcast 2017/01/09 18:32 GMT

First broadcast 2017/01/09 18:32 GMT: Trump's Manufacturing Rebuild Puts Carmakers In Spotlight

BBC World Service - World Business Report, Trump's Manufacturing Rebuild Puts Carmakers In Spotlight

Ford and Fiat Chrysler will build in the US, but BMW is committed to new plant in Mexico.

A thank you from Donald Trump today - in tweet form - to two American car manufacturers. He's praised Ford for saying last week it would expand in the US state of Michigan rather than building a new plant in Mexico. And he's thanked Fiat Chrysler after it announced plans to build three new Jeep models in the US and move production of a pickup truck from Mexico to the States. However another manufacturer - Germany's BMW - has said it is 'absolutely' committed to a new plant in Mexico despite Donald Trump's threats to impose what he's called a border tax - perhaps as much as 35% - on manufacturers importing cars into the US from Mexico. We speak to Nick Bunkley, reporter for Automotive News, at the Detroit Motor Show.

Britain's carmakers are also facing a degree of uncertainty with the UK's impending exit from the European Union. But that hasn't stopped them selling record numbers of cars. Today the iconic manufacturer Rolls Royce said IT had its second highest sales in its 113 year history. We hear from Rolls Royce CEO Torsten Müller-Ötvös. 

It's a historic week for the Mediterranean Island of Cyprus. UN brokered talks are taking place between the internationally recognised Greek Cypriot south and the Turkish Cypriot north in an effort to reunify the island, which has been divided since an invasion by Turkey in 1974.  

It's 'the best and last chance for a settlement' according to officials on both sides. Fiona Mullen, the head of Sapienta Economics in the capital Nicosia sees positives for both the north and the south in terms of business and economy if reunification takes place. But people in the South rejected reunification in the last time it was put to a referendum in 2004 and it is still not a certainty at all that people in the south would accept it this time around.

The Amazon Echo is a piece of kit that sits in your home and responds to commands. You can tell Alexa, its digital assistant, to order a takeaway or give you a weather forecast, but it has its dangers.  A six year old girl asked Alexa to buy her a doll's house and it ended up on the news. But the airing of Alexa's instructions triggered a whole load of other Alexas in people's homes, to order dolls houses. So Alexa, how do you stop this from happening? She didn't know the answer, so we asked James Vincent, Tech writer for The Verge. 

Photo: President-elect Donald Trump waves before boarding his plane at Gerald Ford International Airport, December 9, 2016 in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Credit: Getty Images.

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