5 at the start of its VIN, while one imported from Japan will begin with the letter J. In the year 2000, according to an article in the magazine Motor, BMW attempted to label its "X5" Sport utility vehicle, made in Spartanburg, South Carolina with a VIN beginning with the letter W – indicating the vehicle was made in Germany. A spokesman for the Society of Automotive Engineers, the agency responsible for assigning the three-digit "World Manufacturer Identifier" that begins the VIN label, was quoted as saying "We assign (codes) according to the dirt the plant's built on, not the headquarters of the company". Big Three "The Big Three" refers to the three largest automobile manufacturers headquartered in the United States. While there have been roughly 1,800 car manufacturers in the US over the course of the 20th century, only three large corporations with considerable sales numbers were left by the 1980s. The term is applied to General Motors, the Ford Motor Company, and FCA US. General Motors General Motors is the largest automobile manufacturer in the United States and was also the world's largest for 77 years. However, in 2008, GM was passed by Toyota. GM is headquartered at the Renaissance Center in downtown Detroit, employs approximately 216,000 people, sold 9.025 million cars worldwide, and had a US$152.35 billion revenue for the year 2015. The corporation sells its vehicles in the United States under the following divisions and subsidiaries: Buick Cadillac Chevrolet GMC Hummer, defunct as of 2010 Pontiac defunct as of 2010 Saturn Corporation defunct as of 2010–11 Oldsmobile defunct as of 2004 Ford Motor Company The Ford Motor Company (FoMoCo) was founded in 1903 by Henry Ford, and is America's second largest and the world's fifth largest vehicle manufacturer according to total sales volume. In 2015, the Ford Motor Company had a total revenue of $149.5 billion and 199,000 employees worldwide. The corporation sells vehicles under the following brand names and subsidiaries: Ford Motor Company Lincoln Mercury defunct as of 2011 Chrysler Founded in 1925 by Walter Percy Chrysler, the Chrysler Corporation has since been one of the most important American automobile manufacturers, consistently ranking as the third-largest for most of the post-war period. The company followed GM's "move up" model, with the Chrysler brand (and the Imperial brand from 1955 to 1975) being the flagship luxury make. In 1998, the Chrysler Corporation officially merged with Daimler-Benz