Mini has increased its US sales from 24,590 units in 2002, to 66,123 units last year. The Mini Cooper has easily been one of the company’s most popular vehicles, but they also have a small selection of variations of the popular car, including the Hardtop, Clubman, Convertible, Countryman, Coupe, Roadster, and Paceman.

As for Mini dealership around the US, there are currently 116 locations spilled out over the states, but the car maker plans for a total of around 130 locations by the end of this year, with construction already under way on some of those new locations. Of course, though, 500,000 sold in 11 years isn’t anything to write home about when you’re General Motors, but for a boutique manufacturer, this is rather impressive.

Mini originally started as a specific car model, built by the British Motor Corporation (BMC) from 1959 until 2000 when BMW bought the naming rights of Mini. From there, the company built new models of the Mini, and while the new look is rather different from the original Mini, the new models still retain the same 4-cylinder, all-wheel drive configuration.

[via Automotive World]

Monster Energy claims it’s the world’s first car backflip, and we can’t really refute that since we’ve never seen it before until now. The driver behind the wheel is Rally Raid world champion Guerlain Chicherit, who spent four years preparing for the stunt. A teaser was posted earlier last month showing off the Mini vehicle in mid-air, but didn’t show the landing — we’re guessing that the first couple of test runs didn’t go so well.

To skip the intro and go straight to the jump, skip to the 0:34 mark.

Granted, the ramps were built specifically to make a small car do a backflip, but that doesn’t make the feat any less impressive. And according to Monster, Chicherit actually performed the stunt twice, both of which were successful jumps — one of which was a test run, and the other was in front of a crowd of spectators.

What do you think the next thing to do a backflip will be? A semi? A tank? Well, it’s not likely a semi or a tank could do a backflip, but you never know. We never thought a snowmobile could do a backflip but here we are witnessing it today. It could be only a matter of time before we see even more crazy things done with heavy machinery.

[via Jalopnik]

Right away, the big thing about these speakers is that they highly resemble the look of the side mirrors of a Mini Cooper and the front is half mirror, half speaker grille. It comes with a slew of nifty features, including NFC automatic pairing, 10 hours of playback time, thanks to the robust internal rechargeable battery.

What’s also impressive is that the top half of the speaker (the mirror portion) also acts a touch screen of sorts. You can adjust the volume and mute it as well. There’s also a touch button that enables voice-activated command capabilities for voice prompts. On the back, you have the NFC sensor and the microUSB port for charging.

The Mirror Boombox weighs just over 12 ounces, so it’s pretty light for such a speaker, and as far as availability and pricing, the speaker will be available later this month with pre-orders starting now. You’ll also be paying $149, which is a pretty penny to pay, but Mini Cooper lovers will no doubt love it.

We’ve seen the Cotton Candy before but the new design is simple, elegant and is a hardened drop resistant plastic that should also help with heat dissipation. Inside this tiny PC we have a dual-core ARM Cortex A9 CPU, ARM Mali-400MP GPU, WiFi b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1 and a micro-SD slot. On each side are the ports consisting of USB and HDMI-out for all types of use. Streaming movies, Android, Games and more to a display and hooking up wireless mice and more. If you’ve seen the Cotton Candy before you probably already know the specs.

FXI has added a micro-USB port to the side as you can see from the images below and the design is a simple white color — although the end caps still come in black. Another important note here is although the FXI currently runs with Ubuntu or Android 2.3 Gingerbread FXI was nice enough to share details regarding Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich. They expect to have full driver support by mid-March and will launch with Android 4.0 ICS options available late March. I want one already!

The FXI Cotton Candy is available for pre-order now for just $199 and as promised should be shipping in March.

It looks essentially like a Mini Cooper that someone just stretched out. It still only seats two but there is an extended area in the back for delivery drivers and those who just want some extra space to carry stuff around. The rear doors fully open to allow complete access to the width of the vehicle, making it easy to put in or take out large parcels. It’s also low, with the floor of the cargo area meeting the average driver at about wast-level.

This is being sold to personal and commercial customers, but it is definitely for those who have volume transport of products as a primary function. There are numerous strap pins to keep the content in place, and a cage prevents anything from spilling into the passenger area. In other words, it’s like a really cute truck. Today’s press release is just a teaser of the new vehicle. It will be on display at the Geneva Motor Show in a couple weeks.