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- <text id=90TT1231>
- <title>
- May 14, 1990: Business Notes:Automobiles
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1990
- May 14, 1990 Sakharov Memoirs
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- BUSINESS, Page 75
- Business Notes
- AUTOMOBILES
- If They Rent, They May Buy
- </hdr>
- <body>
- <p> For automakers, owning a rental-car company is a great way
- to showcase products. Ford has already bought into Hertz,
- General Motors is allied with Avis, and Chrysler owns Thrifty.
- Now a foreign manufacturer is getting into the act. Last week
- Mitsubishi Motors became the first Japanese owner of a U.S.
- agency when it bought control of Value Rent-A-Car for an
- undisclosed sum. Mitsubishi currently supplies 10% of Value's
- 20,000-car fleet, a share that will rise to 85% by year's end.
- After the agency has used the cars, it will turn them over to
- the company's dealer network for resale. And Mitsubishi hopes
- the arrangement will boost its profile by allowing renters to
- try out new models. The automaker hopes to sell 200,000
- vehicles in the U.S. this year, up from 150,000 in 1989.
- </p>
-
- </body>
- </article>
- </text>
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