The ceremony for the oldest and most prestigious award, the Car of the year award constitutes the opening event of the Geneva Motor Show. This year for the first time in the 50-year history of the Car of the year award the Opel (Vauxhall) Ampera/Chevrolet Volt has been voted as ‘Car of the Year 2012’. The Citroën DS 5, Fiat Panda, Ford Focus, Range Rover Evoque, Toyota Yaris and Volkswagen Up! were the six other finalists. The cars were selected from among 35 of the most significant novelties of the year by a total of 59 automobile journalists from 23 European countries.

After a series of exhaustive test drives by the jury, Hakan Matson, president of the panel of international automobile experts, handed over the prestigious Car of the Year award: to the CEO of the Adam Opel AG, Karl-Friedrich Stracke, as well as Susan Docherty, President Chevrolet Europe. The key criteria for selection was innovation, value for money, safety, quality, design and environmental aspects. GM says that it already has 7.000 orders for the Ampera and that the company expects to hit its target of 10,000 sales this year though Europe was never envisioned as the prime market.

Matson, automobile expert of the Swedish business paper Dagens Industri: has said, “The Opel Ampera and its counterpart, the Chevrolet Volt, won in a field of strong competitors, particularly on account of the outstanding technical progress they reflect. With its range extender the Ampera presents a very sound new concept on our way to e-mobility. By solving the problem of range anxiety, it is a remarkable step into future of electrification.” The partnership between the ‘Car of the Year’ jury and the Geneva Motor Show is a long-term one. Hakan Matson: ‘We look forward to the next round in 2013.’ The Car of the Year became the first hot news to leave the 82nd Geneva Motor Show.

via autoblog