Pierre Boutin, who also headed VW in Russia, follows Daniel Weissland as chief of VW Group Canada effective Jan. 1. 

The company said it is closing Chevrolet of Lincoln Park and Cadillac of Lincoln Park. AutoCanada executives said the company has lost C$2 million ($1.5 million) on the stores in the first nine months of the year.

The move comes as Ford “strengthens its focus on products in the heart of the fastest growing segments to meet shifting consumer demands,” the automaker said. Flex output ends the week of Nov. 25.

Daniel Weissland will take over the brand's U.S. operations Sept. 1, about four months after Mark Del Rosso's abrupt resignation.

AutoCanada has rebranded its nine U.S. locations as the Leader Automotive Group under a turnaround plan that includes selling underperforming stores, Canada's lone publicly traded dealership group said.

Magna International trimmed its sales forecast for the year, as it expects a drop in vehicle production in North America and Europe due to weak global demand and the impact of U.S.-China trade tensions.

The cutbacks by General Motors in Canada and Mexico come amid declining new-vehicle sales in North America and in other markets and as trade tensions escalate.

The latest call to discourage vehicle ownership comes from the Google affiliate, which envisions a city with fleets of autonomous vehicles.

The cuts come as overall demand for light vehicles, and some crossovers, cools in the U.S and Canada, and Ford moves to align production with demand.

FCA pushed the third shift's elimination date to Oct. 21 from Sept. 30 “to accommodate a large order” of fleet vehicles, FCA Canada spokeswoman LouAnn Gosselin said in a statement.

As the Canadian market declines and as more assembly plants find themselves in danger of closing in the long term, government must put an emphasis on helping displaced autoworkers at assembly and supplier plants transition into new jobs. 

As the Dodge Grand Caravan approaches the end of production, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles must evaluate its strategy for the minivan market it invented more than 30 years ago.

As GM prepares to close a longtime Canadian assembly plant, and retool it to build replacement parts, some of the factory's 2,300 workers set to lose their jobs will be offered incentives to retire, union officials say.