Trade News

WASHINGTON — Three House lawmakers have joined a push in the Senate to delay certain sourcing and manufacturing requirements in the Inflation Reduction Act's tax credit for consumers buying new electric vehicles.

Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., introduced a bill — known as the Affordable Electric Vehicles for America Act — in September that would create a longer phase-in for the tax credit's North American final assembly requirement as well as its critical mineral and battery component provisions.

U.S. Reps. Terri Sewell of Alabama, Emanuel Cleaver of Missouri and Eric Swalwell of California — all Democrats who won midterm reelections in their states — introduced a companion bill this month.

Sewell said the bill is a "win-win for Alabama, ensuring that automakers and car buyers alike can take advantage of these tax credits immediately."

The mounting effort in Congress comes as the U.S. Treasury Department prepares to issue proposed guidance by Dec. …

There's a phrase that keeps getting tossed around in the autonomous vehicle business: trough of disillusionment.

Cruise CEO Kyle Vogt said it on General Motors' recent earnings call, and Aurora Innovation CEO Chris Urmson used a variation of to describe where the industry is right now. Their comments came after Ford and Volkswagen-backed Argo AI shut down and after a year-long rout in self-driving tech stocks.

What's happening is a brutal shakeout among companies trying to monetize a new technology. Money poured into startups during bubbly days before and during the pandemic. Many of those investments aren't panning out. Companies with cash, technology chops and patient ownership are still in the game. Any company missing just one of those three pieces are going away.

The remaining players are still getting funded and are still eyeing a big prize if they can scale up a business before investors lose interest.

"The laggards are falling behind while…

Modern car buyers can get everything they need to make a purchase decision without coming to the lot. With just a few keystrokes, they can visit multiple dealership websites, research options, lock monthly payments and even complete the deal paperwork. By delivering an efficient, personalized experience when they finally come to your store, you’ll be seen as a trusted expert and not just another typical dealer out for a quick sale.

To help dealerships succeed in this brave new world, CDK Global developed a six-part guide to understanding what prospective buyers want and how to give it to them. Topics include:

The Car Dealership Sales Process: What Shoppers Want From Shopper to Buyer: The Customer Journey Car Dealership Sales Tools: What You Need Dealing with Dealership Inventory Shortages: What to Say Inbound Phone Leads: To BDC or Not to BDC Winning Car Dealership Sales

Today’s customers have the resources necessary to educate themselves and make decisions on thei…

A Buick electric crossover prototype has been photographed undergoing road tests, signaling that the General Motors brand is nearing the start of its transformation to a zero-emissions lineup.

The heavily camouflaged electric vehicle, spotted in southeast Michigan, looks similar in size to the Chevrolet Blazer EV or Equinox EV that GM revealed this year. The prototype appears to share styling elements with the Buick Electra-X crossover concept that GM introduced in China in June, notably the headlight layout.

A spokesman for Buick declined to comment on future products. Buick spokesman Mikhael Farah said Buick "will have an all-electric portfolio in North America by the end of the decade, with our first EV arriving in showrooms in 2024. Buick's future EV products will carry the Electra name, drawing inspiration from Buick's history while appropriately positioning it toward a zero-emissions future."

Buick has said all of its EVs will ca…

Chinese battery maker Sunwoda Electronic Co. has been selected by Volkswagen Group to produce battery packs for the German auto giant’s hybrid vehicles.

The deal to supply VW Group with high-voltage batteries will help it win more such agreements with major global automakers, Sunwoda said this week.

The company didn’t disclose additional details about the deal with VW Group.

Sunwoda, a lithium ion battery maker based in the south China city of Shenzhen, started to supply battery cells, modules, packs and battery management systems to auto manufacturers in 2008.

The company has supplied batteries to Renault SA, Nissan Motor Co., Dongfeng Motor Group, GAC Motor Co., SAIC Motor Corp. and SAIC-GM-Wuling – SAIC’s light-vehicle joint venture with General Motors.

In the first nine months of 2022, Sunwoda shipped 5.9 gigawatt hours of batteries, ranking fifth among Chinese battery suppliers for electrified vehicles and hybrids, according to Korean …

The Buick Century went on sale in China last week as General Motors seeks to expand its presence in the market for premium large multi-purpose vehicles.

The Century is the second large MPV GM is producing at its passenger-vehicle joint venture with SAIC Motor Corp., following the Buick GL8. 

It is equipped with GM’s Ecotec 2.0T turbocharged gasoline engine, a nine-speed Hydra-Matic transmission and 48-volt mild-hybrid system.

The Century is 5,230 mm long, 1,980 mm wide, 1,867 mm tall, with a wheelbase of 3,130 mm. It is similar in size to the GL8, but will slot above the GL8 in price and content.

It features advance connectivity features such as a virtual cockpit system running on a 30-inch display, a 32-inch sliding screen in the partition wall with an integrated camera system and a high-resolution color head-up display.  

The Century's starting price is 529,900 yuan ($73,090) while the GL8 is 232,900 yuan.

The GL8 has rem…

GRAZ, Austria — Fisker Inc. is poised to begin production next week as promised a year ago, although some features, including those that are common on many competing vehicles, may not be ready until 2024.

Early next year, the company plans to add lane-keep assistance, blind-spot monitoring and automatic high beams to its launch edition Fisker Ocean One. By late 2023, it expects to add lane centering and traffic-jam assist. Its Power Bank package for vehicle-to-home and vehicle-to-vehicle charging should roll out over the next two years, according to materials provided to journalists.

CEO Henrik Fisker said his priority is getting vehicles with unique features made and shipped to a growing backlog of customers, especially since over-the-air updates allow for less-critical features to be added later. He has stressed the need for rapid development of models so they can employ the latest technologies, rather than the much-longer processes that automakers have hist…

WASHINGTON - A U.S. judge on Wednesday granted final approval to a class-action settlement worth at least $80 million to resolve claims Volkswagen Group and its Porsche unit skewed emissions and fuel economy data on 500,000 Porsche vehicles in the United States.

The settlement, first reported by Reuters in June, covers 2005 through 2020 model year Porsches. Owners accused the automaker of physically altering test vehicles that affected emissions and fuel economy results.

U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer also approved $24.5 million in attorneys' fees and costs.

Owners of eligible vehicles will receive payments of $250 to $1,109 per vehicle.

Porsche said on Wednesday that it has "been working to develop a solution and to ensure customers are appropriately compensated."

"We are committed to providing our customers with transparent fuel economy and emissions data, and the agreement ensures that customers are fairly reimbursed for any fuel eco…

Demand remains strong for Rivian Automotive Inc.'s R1T pickup and R1S SUV, CEO RJ Scaringe said after the automaker posted a $1.7  billion third-quarter net loss and pushed back the launch of a smaller R2 platform to 2026.

"We continue to see strong demand for our product," Scaringe said on the company's earnings call Wednesday.

Rivian said it had preorders for 114,000 vehicles on its current R1 platform, up from 98,000 that it reported at the end of the second quarter. Those preorders are separate from an Amazon order for delivery vans.

The EV startup recently started a second shift at its Normal, Ill., factory to meet demand for its vehicles, but continues to struggle with supply-chain issues, executives said.

"The second shift is now up and running," Scaringe said. "We're going through the ramp now and it's going well."

The expansion of production comes just over a year after Rivian launched the R1T into the market.

Rivian C…

Tesla CEO Elon Musk unloads almost 20 million shares after buying Twitter. Nissan profits soar on better pricing. Lucid posts a net loss of $670 million in Q3. Plus, the CEO of insurance tech company Humn.ai talks about how mapping risk through a vehicle’s journey can help address insurance issues for fleets.

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Legacy automakers and their dealer networks face some serious decisions as electric vehicles grow in popularity and internal combustion vehicles lose some of their luster under tightening emission regulations.

But few of those decisions are as fundamental as this: Will automakers work with dealers to make the transition to EVs a reality, or will they view the transition as an opportunity to pressure their "trusted business partners?"

This is the struggle playing out right now across Ford Motor Co.'s U.S. dealer network as the automaker implements an Orwellian "Model e" playbook that would treat all dealers equally — as it must under existing franchise laws — while effectively making some more equal than others.

That is wrongheaded, and state dealer associations as well as Ford dealers are right to pressure the automaker to amend some aspects of its strategy.

Ford's requirement that its dealers invest up to $1.2 million in their businesses to pre…

Georgia dealer Jimmy Ellis, CEO of Jim Ellis Automotive Group, died Saturday at a hospital in Roswell, Ga.

He was 67. No cause of death was shared.

All Jim Ellis Automotive locations in metro Atlanta closed Wednesday for funeral services, a black banner atop the company's website read.

Ellis, born Aug. 26, 1955, became CEO of the family business in 2015 after serving as vice president and COO for 18 years.

Loren Roberts, associate director of marketing for Jim Ellis Automotive Advertising Agency, who has worked for the company nine years, described Ellis as a visionary leader.

"His passion and drive instilled confidence and motivation in those that worked for him," Roberts told Automotive News. "But above that, he was a man that cared deeply about his employees and family and took every opportunity to make sure people felt valued and appreciated."

Ellis' parents, Jim and Billie Ellis, poured their life savings into their first dealer…