Trade News

Magna International Inc. deepened its investment into its declared new market for electric vehicle battery enclosures, raising its commitment to nearly $700 million at two plants in Michigan and Ontario to supply major electric truck programs.

Battery enclosures are part of North America's largest parts supplier's plan to establish itself as a crucial producer EV parts and technologies.

Last week, Magna announced a round of new spending on its Ontario manufacturing footprint, including a $198 million investment in a new battery enclosures plant in Brampton, near Toronto. That plant will initially build enclosures for the Ford F-150 Lightning electric pickup before ramping up to also produce enclosures for electric versions of the Ford Explorer and Lincoln Aviator crossovers slated to be built in nearby Oakville, Ontario, in 2024, John O'Hara, president of Magna's body and chassis group, told sibling publication Automotive News Canada.

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As the importance of automotive software grows, the industry will need to do more to attract top talent in the field amid stiff competition from Silicon Valley — and quickly, experts and industry executives said.

"It's not like there aren't a lot of great people working in this space, but compared to the density you might find in Silicon Valley or other more tech-focused industries, it's been a challenge for the auto industry," said Jeff Peters, a partner in mobility early-stage venture capital at Ibex Investors in Denver.

Automotive spending on software is increasing at a rapid clip. S&P Global Mobility expects annual spending on in-vehicle infotainment software development alone to grow 44 percent to $356.1 million by 2027 from $247.1 million in 2022. McKinsey & Co., meanwhile, projects the global market for automotive software to rise 163 percent to $50 billion annually in 2030 from $19 billion in 2019. While the auto industry is an …

Diana Kennedy dropped out of high school at age 18. She admits she was never the best student, often cutting class and struggling to stay engaged.

When Kennedy later took a vocational automotive class, she discovered she enjoyed being around cars and ultimately found a sales position at a dealership.

"Automotive became the outlet for me that got me focused on something," Kennedy said. "Otherwise, I really don't know what direction my life would have headed in. But I feel like automotive came to me at the right time in my life."

Kennedy was naive to the high ratio of men to women in the automotive industry until she joined Price Simms Family Dealerships in 2021 as general manager of Volvo Cars Marin, she said. She quickly realized she was the only woman in the room during meetings. Knowing what the industry had done for her, Kennedy set out to change this.

When she started at the store in San Rafael, Calif., women were 16 percent of the staff. No…

Gary Cowger, a former president of General Motors North America who repaired the automaker's relationship with the UAW after a crippling strike and mentored future CEO Mary Barra, died Friday at his home in Dallas. He was 75.

Cowger had battled cancer for two years before his death, Judy DeMars, his former secretary at GM, told Automotive News.

He retired from GM in 2009, almost 45 years after being hired as a co-op student in his home state of Kansas.

In 1998, Cowger was only months into a stint as chairman of the automaker's Adam Opel unit in Germany when GM Chairman Jack Smith tapped him as the company's top labor negotiator in the aftermath of a costly and bitter UAW strike in Flint, Mich.

To help settle the crisis, Cowger chose Barra, who was an executive assistant to Smith at the time, to head up internal communications. Cowger was Barra's boss for nearly a decade.

He was president of GM North America from 2001 to 2005, then head of…

DETROIT — American Axle and Manufacturing Holdings Inc., despite difficult business headwinds for U.S. auto suppliers, returned to profitability in the fourth quarter.

Net income swung to $13.9 million from a loss of $46.3 million during the same quarter of 2021, the company said Friday. The year-earlier results were impacted by a one-time $42.3 million pension settlement charge.

“It was simply a challenging year and was negatively impacted by supply chain disruptions,” CEO David Dauch said on a call with investors. “Additionally, we navigated higher input costs throughout the year, including rising utility labor and material costs.”

Revenue rose moderately in the fourth quarter, a reflection of continued difficulty with supply chain volatility, the Detroit supplier said in a statement.

American Axle’s revenue rose 12 percent to $1.39 billion, with full-year revenue rising the same percentage to $5.8 billion. The increases were attributed to the …

Volkswagen is prepping an update to the Touareg midsize crossover for 2024 that will sport a light bar flanked by a new set of matrix headlights with 38,400 combined micro LEDs, with the ability to project lane guidance and improve night driving overall.

VW released images this week of the camouflaged Touareg undergoing tests in Swedish Lapland.

The Touareg's standard steel spring running gear and an optional two-chamber air suspension running gear are reworked to achieve an even larger bandwidth between maximum comfort and optimum performance.

The Touareg's "innovision cockpit" receives high-res map data and lane-precise navigation, improved voice control, and wireless Android Auto and Apple CarPlay connectivity. Customer input prodded VW to add softer armrests and center console panels.

VW says the freshened Touareg will be introduced this summer. It dropped the Touareg in the U.S. when the Atlas large crossover was launched, and there are no …

AutoNation Inc.'s fourth-quarter net income slipped 26 percent to $286.4 million while total revenue gained 2 percent to $6.7 million.

The company said it expects prices for new and used cars to decline this year as manufacturers crank up volumes and offer more incentives to price-sensitive buyers.

AutoNation, which pivoted to selling more used cars than new during the pandemic as chip shortages sapped inventory, has been bracing for lower car prices as auto production recovers.

CEO Mike Manley expects the seasonally-adjusted annual rate of light-vehicle sales to be close to 15 million this year, up from 13.7 million in 2022.

“You are going to see improved balance and level of inventory,” he said in a phone interview. “You’ll see it progressively more once you get out of the first quarter.”

The company's fourth-quarter results topped Wall Street expectations and shares rose 4.4 percent to $147.52 in premarket trading. The shares have ralli…

HANOI -- Vietnam's VinFast said North Carolina regulators had given the automaker one of the environmental permits it needs to begin construction on a planned $4 billion EV assembly plant in the state.

The company, a subsidiary of conglomerate Vingroup, has been moving to expand in the U.S., where it hopes to compete with existing automakers.

VinFast was awarded an "Air Permit," the company said, adding it was still seeking other permits for the Chatham Country factory, but would start a tender for construction.

"The Air Permit allows us to start construction on phase 1 of the factory. We will start construction soon," VinFast said, without specifying any time frame.

The company completed the application for the Air Permit in December last year and received approval on Feb. 9, according to the North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality website.

It has also applied for a permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers designed to minim…

STUTTGART -- Mercedes-Benz Group earnings rose by 28 percent in 2022 to 20.5 billion euros ($21.8 billion) on a rise in revenue of 12 percent.

Mercedes-Benz Cars' adjusted return on sales was 14.6 percent, in line with the company's own forecast of 13-15 percent and up from 13.1 percent in 2021, the automaker said in a statement on Friday.

Still, the carmaker forecast a lower adjusted return on sales for the cars division in 2023 of 12-14 percent and group earnings slightly below 2022, even with Mercedes-Benz Cars unit sales expected at the same level.

Incoming orders were sluggish in Europe, and sales in the Chinese market were tepid due to the COVID-19 restrictions in the fourth quarter, the company said in a statement, adding that demand in the United States was still strong.

Sales of top-end cars including the S-Class and EQS all-electric sedan saw particularly strong growth in 2022 and helped the carmaker overcome rising costs.

Globa…

Forget the Super Bowl ads starring Will Ferrell, the Jeep remix of "Electric Boogie" and the spot from Elon Musk's chief critic. The most interesting transportation-related commercial to debut this Super Bowl season is one that never actually aired on network television.

If you missed an advertisement called "The Distance" making the rounds on social media last week, it's worth 1 minute, 27 seconds of your time.

Modeled on Super Bowl-style, extended-length ads, the spot's creator juxtaposes some of America's ambitious achievements, like space travel, with basic failures that thwart a child's ability to reach school without dodging traffic hazards.

"With all this progress moving us into the future, why can't our kids walk, bike and roll a single mile to school like they did in the past," a narrator says.

The advertisement is the brainchild of Tom Flood, principal at Ontario-based Rovelo Creative. He described it as a passion project made with th…

The growing complexity of car electronics delivered Visteon Corp. a record sales year, but the shortage of a specific type of semiconductor has prevented the automotive supplier from capitalizing on demand.

The supplier of cockpit electronics, with roots as a unit of Ford Motor Co., finished the year with $1 billion in sales for the fourth quarter, up 35 percent from the year prior, while net income was level with last year at $35 million.

For full-year 2022, Visteon's net income nearly tripled from the year before to $130 million, on $3.8 billion in revenue, up 36 percent year over year and besting its previous sales record set in 2017.

A primary driver of Visteon's growth was its digital clusters segment, which increased 40 percent year over year with key launches in North America. The segment is anchored by increasingly sophisticated infotainment and dashboard displays.

Of the 45 new product launches, 17 were digital clusters, including in th…

Even as the global microchip shortage slowly improves, some automakers are still feeling pinched more acutely than others, new data shows.

Honda told shareholders this month the semiconductor shortage is bottoming out — but that it has nonetheless cut its global sales expectation for the year ahead. BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Renault and Nissan have not been affected so far this year by the shortage, according to a report this month from Bank of America Global Research analysts, citing data from S&P Global.

But the positive outlook has not spread to every automaker.

Bank of America said Volkswagen is projected to cut about 65,000 autos from its production schedules in the first quarter of this year because of the shortage. Toyota is expected to lose about 58,000 vehicles, while Geely could lose 50,000 units as it grapples with the shortage on top of the impact of COVID-19 in China.

"Improvements are on the way," said Sam F…