Ford's Premier Auto Group (PAG) - the UK based authority that manages the Blue Oval's luxury and exotic subsidiaries - has promised that Fiscal Year 2007 will be a very good year. So good, in fact, that PAG will finally turn a profit for the first time since anyone can remember.

Some say this unlikely due largely to the fact that Swedish marque Volvo has carried most of PAG's fiscal load to the tune of more than $1 Billion in sales per annum whereas Jaguar has nearly eclipsed that figure in negative terms on an annual basis since before Volvo's purchase. And Ford claims to be keeping the Coventry Cat for now.

This begs the question - what is to be the future of Aston Martin - the profitable, limited volume, exotic marque that Ford is so eager to sell (and that no one has bought yet) and loss making Jaguar whose top end XKR GT model closely mirrors the costlier Aston Martin V8 Vantage? Is there a place in the automotive market for both of these marques and their closely related models?

I argue optimism in the ensuing piece.