Trade News

WASHINGTON — The new chief of the nation's top auto safety regulator said the agency hasn't been holding back as it works through a backlog of regulatory to-dos, sorts through first-of-its-kind crash data and steps up an investigation into Tesla Inc.'s Autopilot.

"I think we've probably increased the scrutiny on all automakers since last year," said Steven Cliff, who was confirmed by the Senate in May as NHTSA's 16th administrator. The agency had been without a permanent leader since 2017, when Mark Rosekind resigned as the Trump administration took over.

"We're making sure that the regulations we have on the books are implemented," he said. "If we don't have regulations but there's still a safety defect, we're addressing those issues and getting new regulations on the books as quickly as we can — and all in an effort to enhance safety."

Cliff, 52, spoke Wednesday from his office at the U.S. Department of Transportation in his first interview with Automo…

MILAN -- Lamborghini plans to invest at least 1.8 billion euros ($1.88 billion) to produce a plug-in hybrid lineup by 2024 and more to bring out its full-electric model by the end of the decade, CEO Stephan Winkelmann told Il Sole 24 Ore newspaper.

Lamborghini said last year it would invest $1.5 billion to shift its current models - the Huracan and Aventador sports cars, and the Urus SUV - to plug-in powertrains by the end of 2024.

"We have earmarked 1.8 billion, but in reality, it will be much more - the biggest investment in the history of Lamborghini Automobili," Winkelmann told the paper, adding that the figure did not include the development of the full-electric model.

"The investment will be huge because we have to face the full electric era while maintaining the values of Lamborghini's DNA. It will be a very difficult challenge."

Like its rivals Ferrari, Aston Martin and McLaren, Lamborghini is wrestling with how to shift its lineup to batt…

Volvo Cars will invest 1.2 billion euros ($1.25 billion) to build a new manufacturing plant in Kosice, Slovakia, capable of making 250,000 electric vehicles a year, the automaker said on Friday.

Volvo aims to be an electric-only brand by 2030 and to reach that goal it has said it would need to add another plant in Europe.

Construction of the Kosice factory is set to start next year. Series production of Volvo's next-generation EVs is scheduled to start in 2026, the company said, adding that about 20 percent of the investment is expected to be covered by the Slovakian government.

“Expansion in Europe, our largest sales region, is crucial to our shift to electrification and continued growth," Volvo CEO Jim Rowan said in the release.

Volvo's first new plant in Europe in almost 60 years will be it's third in the region, joining factories in Torslanda, Sweden, and Ghent, Belgium, which have a combined annual capacity of 600,000 vehicles.

Volvo…

A lawsuit alleging CDK Global Inc. omitted crucial information related to its pending sale to investment firm Brookfield Business Partners has been voluntarily dismissed, but six other federal lawsuits alleging similar behavior against the dealership technology company are still active.

The lawsuit, which was voluntarily dismissed by plaintiff Matthew Hopkins on Friday, was filed May 4 in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. It alleged that CDK filed a solicitation statement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that left out "material information with respect to the Proposed Transaction" that made the statement "false and misleading." Hopkins was seeking the filing of a new statement and to block Brookfield's acquisition.

The voluntary dismissal came after a federal judge issued an order to show cause on June 10, noting that the plaintiff "has not identified any concrete harm resulting from the lack of this information, and he h…

DETROIT — Automakers are expected to keep up a brisk pace of new-vehicle introductions over the next four years as the industry recovers from supply constraints and continues pivoting toward electric vehicles, according to the annual "Cars Wars" study of the U.S. product pipeline.

John Murphy, a senior auto analyst at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, said he expects automakers to launch roughly 245 new models over the next four years. That averages out to 61 per year — 50 percent higher than the average over the past two decades.

Of those new vehicles, 60 percent will be either electric or hybrid while 40 percent will be internal combustion.

"It is still very clear from our analysis that the advent of alternative powertrain vehicles, most notably battery-electric, is here, which is encouraging," the study said.

The new model mix from 2023 to 2026 is expected to be 78 percent crossovers and light trucks and 22 percent cars.

Murphy predicts …

WASHINGTON -- The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday declined to hear American Axle & Manufacturing Inc.'s bid to revive its patent on technology for quieting driveshaft noise, in a case that may have clarified the circumstances under which inventions warrant a patent.

The justices turned away American Axle's appeal of a lower court ruling that invalidated the Detroit-based company's patent in a legal fight with rival Neapco Holdings. Critics have said court precedent on patent eligibility has produced unpredictable decisions and undermined the U.S. patent process.

President Joe Biden's administration in May urged the high court to take up the case, saying American Axle's invention was a classic example of a patent-eligible industrial process.

The Supreme Court last addressed patent eligibility in a 2014 ruling called Alice Corp v. CLS Bank International that helped establish a two-part eligibility test. The test requires courts to determine if an invent…

Audi, the Volkwagen Group's luxury brand, started building a new plant in the northeast city of Changchun on Tuesday, bidding to ramp up output of electric vehicles in China, the biggest global market for such vehicles. 

The factory, set to come online by the end of 2024, will be dedicated to producing models based on Audi’s new Premium Platform Electric architecture designed for EVs, the company said. 

The plant will be capable of producing more than 150,000 vehicles a year, with the first three models to be marketed under Audi’s A6 e-tron and Q6 e-tron series, the German luxury brand added, without divulging additional details on the models.

The EV factory will be operated by a newly established EV partnership between Audi, Volkswagen Group and China FAW Group Corp. It will be joined by a new adjacent facility to assemble high-voltage batteries, Audi said. Audi produces four EV models in China, all crossovers: the e-tron and battery vers…

General Motors is forming a separate business unit in Shanghai’s Pudong New Area to expand Chinese imports of some of its most popular and profitable vehicles built and sold mostly in North America.

The Detroit automaker signed a letter of intent with the Pudong New Area government to invest $100 million in the new business, GM’s China unit saidThursday. 

“The new Premium Import business, tailored for China, will present a curated collection of iconic GM products through an innovative platform-based business model,” GM China said.

The import business, with a product portfolio comprised of full-size SUVs, pickup trucks and performance cars, likely under the Chevrolet, Cadillac and Hummer banners, will “address evolving demand in the niche market, complementing GM’s locally produced model and brand lineup,” GM China said. 

GM produces and markets Cadillac, Buick and Chevrolet cars and light trucks at SAIC-GM, a joint venture it established…

Light-vehicle production in Shanghai, China’s industrial hub and financial center, has recovered to normal levels after the city came out of a two-month pandemic-triggered lockdown on June 1, the China Automobile Dealers Association said.

Among the four major vehicle manufacturers that assemble vehicles in the city, Tesla started to produce at full capacity at its Shanghai plant in early June.

By mid-June, combined daily local output at three other automakers – SAIC Motor Corp., SAIC-General Motors and SAIC-Volkswagen – had climbed back to pre-lockdown levels. of 13,000 vehicles. 

SAIC-GM is SAIC’s joint venture with GM while SAIC-VW is SAIC’s partnership with Volkswagen Group. 

Auto output in Shanghai tumbled 75 percent to some 53,500 vehicles in April from a year earlier, as government authorities imposed stringent COVID containment measures that brought much of the city’s economic activity to a standstill. Output slipped another 19 pe…

Ford Motor Co.’s China unit is launching direct sales of the redesigned Ford F-150 Raptor as it continues to explore the market for pickup trucks. 

The F-150 Raptor to be marketed in China -- a two-row, four-door SuperCrew model -- will be priced from 686,800 ($102,510).

The truck will be sold directly to customers with orders offered exclusively on Chinese online messaging app WeChat’s “Ford Pick-up Community” channel. 

Preorders for the pickup began on June 21 with a 20,000-yuan deposit, and deliveries are expected to start toward the end of the third quarter, Ford China said last week. 

Ford China plans to select service agents for the new F-150 Raptor from franchised dealerships at Jiangling Ford Automobile Technology Co., a 49-51 joint venture formed in January between Ford and local partner Jiangling Motors Corp.

Since the introduction of the F-150 Raptor in 2017, the F-150 line has remained the top-selling imported ful…

Geely Holding Group Co., the largest private Chinese automaker, said it delivered the first batch of the world’s first methanol-battery hybrid vehicle. 

The vehicle, priced at 129,800 yuan ($19,373), was adapted from a compact sedan under Geely’s Emgrand brand and is initially being marketed in China.  

It is fitted with a 1.8-liter methanol-powered engine and ternary lithium batteries, with fuel economy that is 40 percent better than a corresponding gasoline model, Geely said.

Geely is one of the few Chinese automakers hoping to develop and sell methanol-powered vehicles in volume. 

It has invested more than 3 billion yuan to develop methanol vehicles since 2005 and has delivered some 27,000 methanol cars and trucks in China, Geely said.

Geely is also seeking to sell methanol vehicles in Europe. Earlier this year, it started to test methanol-powered cars and heavy-duty trucks in Denmark and Iceland. 

General Motors said it is reviving a decade-old program to train first responders on electric vehicles.

The revamped program, named "EV First Responder Training", will focus on fire services, and plans to teach firefighters how to safely respond to incidents involving electric and hybrid vehicles, GM said Thursday.

Some firefighting techniques based on gasoline-powered vehicles, such as puncturing holes in vehicle hoods for water channels, can be dangerous to perform on EVs due to different component placement.

It also aims to combat misconceptions around EV batteries, such as water being dangerous around lithium battery fires.

"Our primary goal is to provide key information directly to first and second responders," Joe McLaine, GM global product safety and systems engineer, said in a statement. "This training offers unique material and hands-on experiences that can help increase responders' awareness of procedures to help maintain safety while in…