Every week, Michael Vaughan will ask five tough questions of auto industry movers and shakers.

This week, the answers are from Paul Cummings, president and chief executive officer of Volvo Cars of Canada and president and CEO of Volvo Auto de Mexico.

Question: In the early nineties, I thought Volvo was going down. Every car you built looked like a shoebox, the engineering was out of date and your big merger with Renault blew up. What saved you?

Paul Cummings: Two things: ingenuity and Ford. When the marriage between AB Volvo and Renault fell apart at the last minute, the company re-dedicated itself to the car business, and bet heavily on a new front-wheel-drive platform. That created the Volvo 850 and a whole generation of other new products. It also galvanized the resolve of many people inside the company to succeed against some pretty formidable odds. When Ford acquired Volvo Car Corp. from Volvo in 1999, it was a re-invigorated, ambitious company with big plans.

Question: It's been five years since Ford took over Volvo. How long can Volvo keep any independence against the sheer weight of Ford? How long before the bean counters at Ford start running the place?

Cummings: From the highest level, the management of Ford has said repeatedly that they didn't spend $6.4-billion to make Volvo into Ford. From Bill Ford himself, we have the assurance -- and the demand -- that Volvo continue to occupy a unique place in the market and in the Ford enterprise. That said, there are also some real business advantages from having the Ford company in your corner. I think the best answer to your question is really the new Volvo S40 sedan and V50 wagon. As you know, the very successful Mazda3, the new Volvo S40 and V50, and the forthcoming European Ford Focus C-Max have a significant amount of shared architecture and technology. Despite that, they don't look alike in any way, and they each have very unique driving characteristics and features. The Volvo S40 is a true Volvo in every way. Each manufacturer has created a different car and yet they all share substantial cost savings from pooling their expertise. That's the best of independence and co-operation.

Question: Everything Ford builds gets crashed first in Sweden at the Volvo Cars Safety Centre in Sweden. Doesn't that risk stretching Volvo's safety expertise too far?

Cummings: That hasn't been a problem to date. Volvo is the "Centre of Excellence" for safety within Ford but it also benefits from Ford's resources. We're sharing best practices among highly evolved engineering groups, an exchange among peers at Volvo and Ford. That's not necessarily a drain on your resources; that's part of the synergies we get among the companies.

Question: Perhaps more than any other car company, Volvo trades heavily on its brand. When you say Volvo, everyone thinks safety. But now Volvo is into tactical marketing -- ads for incentives on lease rates, discounts or low monthly payments. You're selling the deal, not the car; isn't that harmful to your brand?

Cummings: It's precisely because we have a strong brand that we can be very specific about our offer to customers. There's no question that the whole industry has shifted advertising and marketing more toward the transaction, whether it's lease rate or finance rate or some other offer. That's because customers expect us to provide two products: a vehicle and a mechanism to acquire it. Incentives have dominated the market recently, and to make them effective you have to advertise them. Virtually every luxury brand has advertising today that promotes its incentives. That was unheard-of just a few years ago.

Question: Then how do you rationalize your current brand image, which revolves around safety, with a new product like the S60 R, that sells itself on its 300-horsepower, high-tech suspension and other technology that's clearly designed to go fast? Is the brand safety or speed?

Cummings: We don't think we have to give up one for the other. Safety is as much a part of Volvo as Sweden is a part of Volvo. It's a core value, it's a heritage... it underpins everything we do. But it doesn't restrict us. We say, "Safety plus . . ." So with the V70 wagon, we say, "Safety + Versatility". With the S60, it's "Safety + Sporty." Naturally, the S60 R and V70 R are "Safety + Performance." Everything about the performance technology has safety as a consideration: The tuning of the Four C chassis, the set-up of the all-wheel drive system, the way the stability control system works, the huge Brembo brakes... it all makes safety a consideration in how the car performs.

Car/Business with Michael Vaughan and Jeremy Cato appears Monday nights at 8:30 p.m. on Report on Business Television