Mercedes 1999 Annual Report Download - page 21

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FRONTRUNNER
15
The Chelsea Proving Grounds is another, though quite differ-
ent, link. Based at Chelsea is Michelle O’Connor Martindale,
one of a handful of women in the automotive industry now
pursuing fast-track careers in vehicle dynamics. She, too,
made her own inspired choice. In an aircraft between
DaimlerChrysler’s twin capitals, Detroit and Stuttgart, 27-
year-old Martindale describes the pure pleasure of her work.
Each weekday, she thunders round the Chelsea test track,
testing the soon-to-be-unveiled new Chrysler coupe, another in
the long line of “concept cars” that Board of Management
member Tom Gale calls “icons”. Says Gale: “These are cars and
projects that, from the company’s earliest days, have dazzled
the industry. When Chrysler was down on its luck in the hard
days of the Eighties, they became rallying points for the pride
and energy of the company its people wanted it to be. Cars
like the Portofino or the Viper – windows into the future of au-
tomotive design, and also catalysts for – and symbols of - deep
corporate change and inspiration.” For Tom Gale and Auburn
Hills, the concept car is the point where tomorrow’s vision,
today’s technology, and that deep sense of the classic that
comes down from the past, meet the road on four wheels.
Martindale’s devotion to cars is virtually genetic – her father
and grandfather were Detroit autoworkers. But it was she
who first had the good sense to head for Auburn Hills –
with the first college degree her motor-mad Michigan family
ever had.
For people like Dirk Walliser, the scientist-strategist with his
passion for a life-changing technology, and Michelle Martin-
dale, the test-engineer daughter of an Irish autoworker with
her passion for break-away design, the world of Daimler-
Chrysler is a place of unique opportunity and robust com-
petitive challenge. For the people of DaimlerChrysler, that
world, with its ever more complex and rapidly changing mar-
kets, cultures and technologies, is also the subject of intense
curiosity. Their curiosity, their passion for cars, their de-
termination to be first and best in whatever they do, are
“Every euro, every dollar that
we spend on R & D goes to
providing our customers with a
safer, more comfortable and more
ecologically friendly ride. These
innovations are a key to securing
and consolidating the business
success of this company.”