Items from Jim Mateja's notebook.

_Mercedes-Benz has put a base price of $85,500 on its all-new, premium luxury CL500 coupe, which goes on sale this month.

_After 10 years of selling cars and sport-utility vehicles in the United States, Lexus has produced its 1 millionth vehicle and donated it, a Millennium Silver RX300, to the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles, where it will be displayed for six months and auctioned with proceeds to fund the museum.

_General Motors Corp. has offered to pay $5.3 billion to $6.2 billion to take over South Korea's ailing Daewoo Motor Co. Reportedly, Ford Motor Co. is in the background should negotiations between Daewoo and GM fall through.

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