The U.S. auto industry went to the brink. It was rescued by massive amounts of taxpayer money. Brands, factories and dealers shuttered. The business went through traumatic changes. But one thing has not changed: The antiquated way of selling cars. No, I’m not talking about selling cars via the Internet or Costco. I’m talking about build-to-order. A.k.a. “mass customization.” It’s not a pipe dream. It’s done every day. Just not in America. (Read More…)
Forget about Europeans complaining about missing parts. Over in America, there is an acute car shortage. Dealers blame who they always blame: The manufacturers. “They’ve cut back production so much that we’ve run out of cars,” Boston dealer magnate Herb Chambers tells his hometown paper, the Boston Herald. He says he had to “beg, borrow and steal” Cadillacs from dealers in other parts of the country. Down at the South Shore, dealer Dan Quirk loses 60 to 90 sales a month. “The Big Three just don’t have enough manufacturing capacity any more,” kvetches Quirk. “Some of the automakers, particularly General Motors, closed a lot of their plants when the meltdown hit.” Supposedly it’s not just a Bostonian phenomenon. Supposedly. At closer look, it might be a fire breathing, rip-snorting chimera. (Read More…)
Last Friday, production of the Volkswagen Passat was stopped in Emden, Germany. Not because there aren’t enough customers for the car. There are too many. (Read More…)
Isn’t it great to have the government as your biggest shareholder? Makes for good photo-ops. For the second time, Barack Obama went behind the wheels of a Chevy Volt, with the world press in attendance. Actually, it was the Volt’s European twin, the Ampera.
The Prez. had to weigh national security and time at the NATO summit in Lisbon against checking out the range extended Opel, and the Opel won. (Read More…)
The first time I came to Houston, TX, was in 1986. The “reverse oil crisis” had brought the price of crude below $10, and Houston was a ghost town. In nearby Port Arthur, unused oil rigs piled up at the shore, and grass grew on downtown Procter Street. Now, Houston, home of the Petroleum Club (and some clubs the greater Baruth family would fancy), could become the model city for electric vehicles. According to plan, nobody will be farther away from a charging station than five miles, and you can charge up as much as your EV can eat for a flat monthly fee. (Read More…)
Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund, via its investment vehicle AMubadala Development Co, has sold back its 5 per cent stake in Ferrari to Fiat. It’s not that the sheiks were tired of Ferrari. Fiat wanted their shares back. Fiat had an option that gave it the right to buy back the stake that Mubadala had acquired in 2005 from Mediobanca, Italy’s largest investment bank for €114 million, domain-b reports.
Fiat paid €122m ($167m) to buy back the stock. Now their holdings climbed from 85 percent to 90 percent. Why would you want 90 percent in a small sports car maker if you already have 85 percent, and you need every penny of cash? (Read More…)
Did you know that there’s an Electric Drive Transportation Association? It’s a group that wants you to ditch your ICE-powered car and run on battery instead. Their member list is huge. Just about every important automaker is on it. Utility companies from Austin Energy all the way to the Tennessee Valley Authority are members. Battery manufacturers, component suppliers, infrastructure developers are members. The City of New York is. Hertz is. And if things get dicey, the association can call upon their member L-3 Communications-Combat Propulsion Systems to provide fire support.
But as big as they are, they are scared. They are worried that customers may not plug in. Or, as Reuters put it, they are concerned that “the ‘range anxiety’ drivers of plug-in electric cars may suffer is preceded by anxiety over the wisdom of buying one.” And what do they do to allay these fears? Cheaper cars? Longer lasting batteries? Free charging stations? (Read More…)
Stefan Jacoby, CEO of bought-by-Geely Volvo needs to bring down the cost of Volvo’s European-made cars.
So where will the new Volvo factories be? You have two tries.
China? Check. Volvo might actually open three factories in China, Stefan Jacoby said recently in Stockholm. Details should be forthcoming within the next weeks.
Ok, now for another country … (Read More…)
Honda had been the first automaker that had the Insight to sell a hybrid in the U.S. But what about pure battery-powered ones? After a lot of hesitation, Honda will throw an all-electric Fit on the U.S. market, says Bloomberg. The plug-in will arrive in 2012, which might as well be pronounced “year of the EV.”
The car will be standard EV fare: Lithium-ion-powered, range about 100 miles between charges – on a good day. A price has not been announced. Expected volume? It “will be small” said Honda President Takanobu Ito at the Los Angeles Auto Show. (Read More…)
Xiang Dong “Mike” Yu, 49, of Beijing, pleaded guilty in federal court in Detroit to two counts of theft of trade secrets. He will be sentenced in February 23, 2011. He’s looking at anywhere between 5 and 6 years in the slammer. He will also have to pay a fine of $150,000. After serving his sentence, he will be deported from the United States. That’s a lenient sentence, only reached through a plea bargain.
In case you ever want to spy on your employer, here is what not to do: (Read More…)
Toyota is the king of the hybrid hill, but they have been accused of dragging their heels on pure plug-ins. Then Toyota plunked $50m on Tesla (and convinced them to move into the NUMMI plant.) This got people thinking. Some thought it was just an elegant way to unload the NUMMI plant. Some saw it as the beginning of Toyota’s electric future. Half a year later, Toyota puts their concrete plans on the table. (Read More…)
It’s definitive: The fabled New York Yellow Cab will either be replaced by a minivan made in Japan, or by a something made in Turkey. After a long “Taxi of Tomorrow” competition, the NYC’s Taxi has now announced the final contestants:
Which one would the “Buy American” crowd prefer? The answer is easy: (Read More…)
Ready to buy some GM share tomorrow? A consummate insider who sits on the board of an important GM company says: Don’t.
Klaus-Franz, Chair of the Opel works council and Vice Chairman of the Opel supervisory board warns: “The IPO is premature. Sure, GM has delivered three good quarters. But he restructuring in Europe must be finished to give investors the visibility they need.”
Franz knows the skeletons hidden in Opel’s closet. In an interview with Germany’s Focus Magazine, Franz gives valuable investment advice to potential GM shareholders. To repeat: “Don’t.” (Read More…)
Mazda is passing the hat around to collect the money to buy out most of Ford’s remaining share, and what looks like half of Japan is chipping in. As many as 10 firms will purchase the Mazda shares that are still held by Ford, says The Nikkei [sub]. Ford plans to cut its 11 percent stake in Mazda to a symbolic 3 percent. (Read More…)
Establishing R&D centers in China by foreign automakers is a huge trend. Of course, the trend was led by GM, which already has an alphabet soup of tech centers (PATAC, CAERC, and CATC) in the Shanghai area. Now, Toyota follows with their own. Following prevailing fashion, it will be called TMEC. (Read More…)
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