Gigafactory, Audi, Japan, Airbus, Porsche.

Gigafactory deal: Tesla and Panasonic seem to have come to an agreement as the Japanese are expected to sign a contract this month to support Tesla in building its battery factory. Panasonic will invest 200 million dollars while two billions will come from the Californian carmaker. The rest of the required 4-5 billion dollars Tesla hopes to raise from other partners. Could Apple or Samsung be among those?
electric-vehiclenews.com, seekingalpha.com (partners)

Diesel e-tron first for A8: At the beginning of next year, Audi will introduce its new plug-in hybrid with a 3-litre V6 turbodiesel and a system power of 368 hp and 700 Nm of torque. It is set to appear first in the A8 before eventually being implemented in the A6 and Q7.
autoexpress.co.uk

Backing for H2: The Japanese government is planning to support the purchase of a fuel cell vehicle from domestic carmakers with two million yen (20,000 dollars). Additionally, more than 100 H2-fuelling stations will be set up. Just recently, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe drove and refuelled the Toyota FCV himself.
asia.nikkei.com, greencarcongress.com, motornature.com (prime minister)

Electric Airbus from 2017: The European aircraft company has publicly presented a prototype of its ultra-lightweight electric plane called E-Fan at the Farnborough International Air Show in England. From 2017, the E-Fan 2.0 that sits two is set to be commercialised and Airbus hopes to be able to offer the E-Fan 4.0, a four-seater, shortly after.
transportevolved.com, greencarreports.com, youtube.com (video)

Porsche is to invest in engine technology and has just opened three new buildings at its R&D facility in Swabian Weissach. Investment will go further as Porsche plans to spend 95 million euros (128.6m dollars) by 2017 for the development of new engine technologies, including hybrid systems.
automotiveworld.com (Weissach centre), kfz-betrieb.vogel.de (new investments, in German)