If you answered yes to both questions, chances are you’re feeling relatively isolated from the economic pressures of the recession. Congratulations! Now go treat yourself to one of these iPhone applications compiled by CarType. Thanks to the power of Steve Jobs you can now shop for car insurance, look up the lowest gas prices in town, receive RSS updates on cars for sale, receive press releases from MINI, VW and Mercedes Benz, calculate your mileage, look up EPA ratings, receive traffic alerts in a number of countries, and play a plethora of time-wasting games all from your phone. Delphi’s James Bond-like bluetooth control for complete vehicle systems (first teased a year ago) is, sadly, still not available on the consumer market.
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Posts By: Edward Niedermeyer
Gentlemen, start your “German Engineering” jokes! The Windsor Star reports that Chrysler’s Windsor Assembly Plant has received a “no build” order for Routans in the month of February, despite workers returning from a long winter break on February second. According to a union local official, VW requested a month’s furlough of Routan production, “in order to adjust their inventory. Sales are slow across the board and VW is no different.” Local 444 President Rick LaPorte calls the no build order “worrisome in terms of volumes.” Windsor had been assembling 300 Routans per day, but with 30k of the rebadged Caravans sitting in the VW dealer net, slow sales are becoming a major concern. VW sold 8,812 Routans last year, falling well short of the pace needed to meet sales goals of 35k units per year (3k-4k per month). Read TTAC’s review of the Routan here.
The Freep reports on the analysis of JP Morgan’s Eric Selle and Atiba Edwards, who argue that GM bondholders could emerge from negotiations with a 20 percent stake in the world’s second-largest automaker. GM must outline a strategy to eliminate two-thirds of its $35b in unsecured debt by February 17. “We expect a bond exchange will settle around 35% of par with an equity component representing 20% of GM’s equity,” write Selle and Edwards. But the JP Morgan analysts warn that the “threat of bankruptcy will have to return in order for GM to achieve the required restructuring goals.” What, again?
Tesla has failed to secure the $100m it needed to continue with plans to build a headquarters on San Jose, CA’s Zanker Road, reports the San Jose Business Journal. Tesla had also planned to build a $250m manufacturing facility on the site, which would have assembled the firm’s development hell-bound White Star sedan. “We abandoned that because the VC financing environment became so tight and difficult,” say Tesla spokesfolks. Instead, Tesla has applied for about $400 million in two federal, low-interest loans through the Advanced Technology Vehicle Manufacturing Program. It is seeking $250 million for the Model S manufacturing facility and $150 million for an advanced battery and powertrain facility. But this means that the Zanker Road site can not be used, since the ATVMP funds may only be used to refurbish and retool existing facilities, not build at greenfield sites like Zanker Road. “We’re very optimistic, even with Zanker Road,” said Michelle McGurk, senior policy adviser to San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed. “We know all the reasons Zanker Road made sense, and it still might make sense depending on how things shake out.” Or not. “We can’t afford to do anything that would jeopardize our ability to get the federal loan,” says Tesla spokeswoman Rachel Konrad. She notes that Tesla is looking at other existing sites which might qualify for refurbishing loans. And the march from private to public funding sources for the auto industry continues unabated.
Motorauthority reports that the long-rumored Buick C-segment sedan will probably be built at Opel’s Rüsselsheim plant. The Delta II-based entry-level Buick will utilize production capacity freed by plans to produce the Delta II-based Saab 9-3 at Saab’s Trollhättan plant. Since the American Astra experiment has gone so badly, GM needs a higher-margin Delta II vehicle to justify expensive tooling efforts at Rüsselsheim. Hence the Buick plan. But the whole scheme is based on the misguided effort to leverage Buick’s Chinese revival into a global phenomenon. With the future of Saturn, Buick, Pontiac and Saab up in the air, with HUMMER on death row, GM is trying to chart a course based on constantly-changing assumptions. And a raft of unneeded brands. Once again, The General seems to believe that simplification is not an option.
OK, so I linked to this in the post below, but it really deserves its own post. After all, few things define the times quite as poignantly as Chrysler’s peculiar brand of insanity. See, the problem with the psychology of recession is that it causes inordinate self-doubt among panicked executives and their long-suffering staffs. Which, if you’re Chrysler, might be a good thing. Except that for some reason, the principles of reflection and continuous improvement always take a back seat to some brainiac who thinks that the problem is that the firms products aren’t exactly like iPods. At Chrysler, this brainiac is named Peter Arnell. In an interview with AdWeek, Chrysler’s “Chief Innovation Officer” lives up to his cliched title by spewing the most ridiculous twaddle about his pet project, the Chrysler PeaPod. For those who don’t know, the PeaPod is a GEM Low Speed (Neighborhood Electric) Vehicle (LSV/NEV). This means that the PeaPod is limited to 25 mph and is barred from thoroughfares with speed limits of higher than 35 mph. In other words, it’s useless. Unless you live on a golf course or in a gated retirement community. But the way Arnell tells it, the PeaPod is just a Wired Magazine cover away from becoming the next Apple killer app.
Green Car Congress reports that the Senate Committe On Finance is recommending (PDF) increases in the amount and size of the plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV) tax credit. The proposal has been put forward as part of Barack Obama’s stimulus plan, the American Recovery And Reinvestment Act Of 2009. The availability of PHEV tax credits would be doubled under the plan, from 250k to half a million vehicles sold before the credit phases out. The tax break amount is unchanged, with a base credit of $2,500 per qualifying PHEV plus $417 for each kilowatt-hour of battery capacity in excess of four kilowatt-hours. For vehicles under 10k lbs, the maximum credit is $7,500. Credits increase by vehicle weight, but the maximum (for vehicles over 26k lbs) is $15k.
Poor Ford. All they wanted to do was claim to offer “the most efficient midsized car in America.” “We’ve been pretty clear, probably annoyingly clear, to Toyota that we’re comparing Fusion to Camry,” Ford spokesman Mark Truby tells USA Today (via Daily Tech). After all, the Camry gets a paltry 33 city/34 highway rating from the EPA. At 41/36 mpg, the Fusion is clearly a more efficient mid-sized car than the Camry. But wait!
You may recall this headline. That’s because we’ve already used it: “Chrysler Ends Jobs Bank on Monday. Calls It Something Else. Will Reinstate ASAP.” In said post, we debunked the idea that the United Auto Workers (UAW) was making anything resembling a concession. To refresh your memory, the union said the action on the Jobs Bank was a temporary suspension, rather than an outright elimination. Today, Bloomberg reports that the 1,600 GM employees currently enjoying the benefits of the UAW jobs bank will be out in the cold as of February second. But not really. GM spokesman Tony Sapienza tells Bloomberg that those leaving the jobs bank will get state unemployment benefits and “some GM pay.” Over at Automotive News [sub], Sapienza said GM is discussing “supplemental pay” [emphasis added] with the union “as part of current negotiations.”
Remember the good old days when the US was committed to free trade, and constantly complained about Japanese protectionism? Those days are long gone, as the US is now a world leader in national bailouts and it has become Japan’s turn to stand on free-trade principle. Detroit News‘s Christine Tierney reports that Japan has no interest in joining China, Germany, France, Russia and the US in subsidizing either production or consumption of vehicles. “We regard the auto industry as very independent from the government,” said Noriyuki Shikata, director of the Second North America Division at Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “Our government hasn’t extended massive subsidies to companies. A company like Toyota has accumulated some cash and should be able to survive.”
The last time we heard that GM’s new Flint engine plant was canceled, we listed it as a Volt Birth Watch. After all, Flint was supposed to produce 1.4 liter four-cylinder engines for Volt range-extender duty as well as for the Cruze and siblings (in turbo form). But as we noted then, GM insists that Volt and Cruze will go ahead as planned regardless of whether the Flint plant is built. How? By importing 1.4s from Austria, according to MLive. But are imported engines included in those old “unprofitable at $40k” Volt cost estimates? We’d guess not. In any case, ABC reports that Flint conctracts have been canceled, and GM just ain’t sweating these details. Volts will have engines come 2010, and damn the german accent. And massive unprofitability. And already-approved tax credits. And patriotic subtext. So really, this is just another “GM manages to pee on its own leg” post. The Volt is just fine, thanks for asking.
Mission-critical musical lyric: “you are the victim.”
Newly-confirmed Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner highlights “President Barack Obama’s firm commitment to transparency, accountability and oversight in our government’s approach to stabilizing the financial system,” in his announcement today of reforms to the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act (EESA). Details on the reforms are sketchy at the moment, as the new President’s commitment to vague details remains firmly in place. Read the Treasury press release here, or hit the jump for the salient points. Still no comment from the DC (neé Detroit) Two on the development, or word from the Treasury on whether this effects Terminator product placement.
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