CLEVELAND, N.C.—Daimler Trucks North America will hire 1,100 workers to build long-distance trucks at its NC Freightliner plant as it bulks up after recession layoffs. The company, a division of Germany's Daimler AG, said it will also add 100 jobs to a nearby parts plant. The Freightliner...

OTTAWA—Saskatoon, Calgary, Edmonton and Regina will benefit from solid global demand for their resources to post the strongest economic growth among Canadian cities in 2012, according to a new Conference Board of Canada (CBOC) report. The Metropolitan Outlook-Winter 2012 analyzes 27 Canadian...

PITTSBURGH—Alcoa Inc. is shuttering three European aluminum smelters as part of its plan to cut global smelting capacity by 12 per cent. The company says it’s closing smelters in Portovesme, Italy and two plants in La CoruIna and Aviles, Spain by 2013—plants the company says are...

DETROIT—Riding strong sales in the U.S. and China, General Motors Co. (GM) is on track to retake the title of world's top-selling automaker, beating out Volkswagen and Toyota. GM lost the crown to Toyota in 2008 after holding it for more than seven decades. It won't release global sales...

DETROIT—General Motors Co. is advising Chevrolet Volt owners to return their electric cars to dealerships for repairs to lower the risk of battery fires. Three Volt batteries caught fire after government crash tests last year, prompting a U.S. federal investigation, sending GM engineers into...

DETROIT—Chrysler will add 1,250 jobs at two Detroit factories next year. The Detroit-based automaker will add 1,100 people to its Jefferson North factory—where it assembles the Jeep Grand Cherokee—to build a diesel model for North America next year. The plant will get a third...

BEIJING—Canadian-built Pratt & Whitney engines will power China’s latest aerospace innovation, the 13.8 ton AC313 super helicopter. China's civil aviation authority has cleared the country's biggest-ever helicopter for domestic use, according to state-owned Aviation Industry...

TORRANCE, Calif.—A Los Angeles woman who says her hybrid Honda Civic hasn’t lived up to its high-mileage promises and wants the automaker to pay for not delivering the 21 kilometres per litre (kpl) it promised. But rather than being one of thousands in a class-action lawsuit,...

National Optronics, in Charlottesville, Virginia, produces high-precision machines for surfacing and finishing plastic eyeglass lenses. In use at optical laboratories and stores such as Walmart and LensCrafters, these machines include blockers, tracers, edgers, and surface generators.In 2008, in an...

TOKYO—Nissan's LEAF has made quite a bang in the Canadian automotive market, with both consumers and municipalities. But if you've ever wondered how the little electric car is made, Nissan's opened its factory doors to show how it builds its award winning compact EV. Check out the super-cool,...

MONTREAL—It’s been a busy holiday season for transportation giant Bombardier. Just a day after announcing the company’s rail segment had won contracts in the U.K. and Germany worth close to $950 million, Bombardier Aerospace received an order for five of its Challenger 850...

BERLIN—Bombardier Transportation has secured an order for 130 of its Electrostar rail for the Southern Rail Company in Britain in a contract worth $296 million. The new trains will be manufactured in the U.K. with production starting in the latter half of 2012. Bombardier says it currently...

TORONTO—Canada's largest private sector union has called upon Ottawa to review the purchase of Canada's only locomotive manufacturing plant by U.S.-based Caterpillar Inc. in 2010. The Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) union says hundreds of jobs at the Electro-Motive plant in London, Ont., are...