Trade News

SHANGHAI — Nio Inc. said on Saturday it suspended production after China's measures to contain the recent surge of COVID-19 cases disrupted operations at key suppliers.

"Since March, due to reasons to do with the epidemic, the company's supplier partners in several places including Jilin, Shanghai and Jiangsu suspended production one after the other and have yet to recover," the company said on its mobile app.

"Due to the impact of this Nio has had to halt car production."

The Chinese manufacturer will postpone EV deliveries to users and will work together with suppliers to strive for resumption while meeting the government's COVID curbs, it added. 

China has adopted strict lockdown measures to contain the spread of the highly contagious Omicron variant in several places including Jilin province and Shanghai where plants of major auto part makers and automakers are located.

Tesla has suspended production at its Shanghai plant si…

As an automotive finance veteran of nearly 30 years, Sue Wilke opposed the hybrid model of individual dealership employees managing both sales and finance and insurance.

"I was a hundred percent against it," Wilke, finance director and sales manager of Lompoc, Calif.-based RocketTown Honda, told Automotive News.

She recalled an encounter with Cindy Merry, finance director of a dealership group in Alaska that has thrived for years with a hybrid format. "I told her, 'You're crazy,' " Wilke said.

Then COVID-19 struck in March 2020. RocketTown was forced to adopt appointment-only sales and lay off a sales force of about 10 people, two finance staffers and an Internet sales manager. But when conditions improved in 2020 and RocketTown Honda needed to add staff, it seemed sales personnel wouldn't have enough volume to earn a decent living, Wilke said.

The dealership switched to a hybrid format as it brought back three of its staffers throughout 2020. On…

When electrification was on the horizon, Jeep knew exactly where to go with its message.

The brand known for touting off-road excursions has stuck to an outdoorsy formula for its 4xe line of plug-in hybrids.

The marketing transition could be seen in 2020 when Jeep started touting the quiet ride of the Wrangler 4xe months before it went on sale, saying it accentuated the sounds of nature.

Then, Jeep's ode to Earth's preservation called "Pale Blue Dot," which featured a voice-over from scientist Carl Sagan and the Wrangler plug-in, further set the tone.

Since then, Jeep has coined a mission statement of "Zero Emission Freedom" and is putting its stamp on the electrified segment with branded charging stations at trailheads across the U.S.

"Jeep loves nature, and we want nature to know this," Olivier Francois, chief marketing officer for Jeep parent Stellantis, told Automotive News. "It's all a matter of mutual respect. So it sounds extremely …

When electrification was on the horizon, Jeep knew exactly where to go with its message.

The brand known for touting off-road excursions has stuck to an outdoorsy formula for its 4xe line of plug-in hybrids.

The marketing transition could be seen in 2020 when Jeep started touting the quiet ride of the Wrangler 4xe months before it went on sale, saying it accentuated the sounds of nature.

Then, Jeep's ode to Earth's preservation called "Pale Blue Dot," which featured a voice-over from scientist Carl Sagan and the Wrangler plug-in, further set the tone.

Since then, Jeep has coined a mission statement of "Zero Emission Freedom" and is putting its stamp on the electrified segment with branded charging stations at trailheads across the U.S.

"Jeep loves nature, and we want nature to know this," Olivier Francois, chief marketing officer for Jeep parent Stellantis, told Automotive News. "It's all a matter of mutual respect. So it sounds extremely …

An employee of a Toyota dealership in northern Illinois died Thursday evening after being shot in the store's parking lot, local police said.

Police in Loves Park, Ill., said Anderson Toyota employee Daniel R. Johnson, 29, was shot and that "the evidence indicates this was a targeted incident and not a random act of violence."

Paramedics arrived at the dealership and attempted lifesaving measures, but Johnson, a Rockford, Ill., resident, ultimately died, according to the news release.

Roman C. Richmond, 27, was charged in the shooting, police said in the statement.

Police filed five charges against Richmond on Friday: first-degree murder, aggravated battery with a firearm, aggravated discharge of a firearm, possession of a weapon by a felon and aggravated unlawful use of a weapon.

Richmond is being held at Winnebago County Jail on no bond. He had several warrants out for his arrest, including theft, criminal trespass, residential burglary a…

CDK Global Inc. plans to join its privately held competitors in the dealership management system market this year, perhaps giving the company more flexibility to pursue longer-term growth strategies than public shareholders want to tolerate.

The decision to take CDK off the Nasdaq exchange by selling to global investment firm Brookfield Business Partners — in a deal valued at $8.3 billion — will accelerate the company's growth strategy around creating a seamless vehicle-purchasing experience for consumers, COO Joe Tautges told Automotive News.

"We've done fine as a public company, and we've done a great job over the last several years really improving the core business," Tautges said Thursday. "We saw a great opportunity to create value for [shareholders] and really align with a buyer here who is a very value-added, reputable private equity owner. And it just levels the playing field, quite frankly."

It's too early to know how the ownership change will …

WASHINGTON — With record-low levels of new-vehicle supply and no near-term fix for replenishment, most dealerships using the "last in, first out" inventory accounting method now face significant tax burdens, and the deadline to pay up is fast approaching.

Businesses on LIFO — a tax deferment strategy used by about half of the nation's new-vehicle dealerships — must maintain a sufficient level of inventory at year end to avoid triggering a potentially large income tax bill.

But production issues related to COVID-19 and the microchip shortage greatly reduced the flow of new vehicles to dealership lots and curtailed inventories starting in 2020 and worsening in 2021. That made the long-deferred income suddenly taxable at federal and state levels.

For some dealers, the LIFO recapture has led to additional tax payments from $100,000 to $2 million or more, and those bills are due in less than two weeks for dealerships structured as pass-through entities or C …

As General Motors pushes prices of its gasoline-powered pickups and SUVs ever higher with offerings such as the new GMC Sierra Denali Ultimate trim topping $80,000, it's working with Honda to make electric vehicles as inexpensive as possible.

GM and Honda said this week they're planning a line of electric crossovers that will cost less than $30,000, well below the price of the industry's average gasoline vehicle today.

The automakers intend to sell millions of co-developed "affordable" EVs starting in 2027. The vehicles, mostly compact crossovers, will be based on a new global electric architecture powered by GM's Ultium battery technology and use jointly created advanced battery technology.

By volume, "this is by far the most significant collaboration by any two large OEMs," said Jesse Toprak, chief analyst for Autonomy, which runs an EV subscription service. "This could be the most significant automotive partnership that really turns on that switch of…

AutoCanada Inc. has hired away two AutoNation Inc. managers, naming one of them as its new president to head Canadian operations, following the departure of Michael Rawluk on March 3.

Jeffrey Thorpe, market president for Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based AutoNation, will take over oversight of publicly-traded AutoCanada’s 60 Canadian dealerships as president of those operations, the Edmonton, Alberta firm said Friday.

AutoCanada Executive Chair Paul Antony said Thorpe has “proven himself” scaling organizations and has both the vision and business acumen to keep the dealership group’s momentum going.

“His significant industry expertise and experience operating a dealership platform at scale using centralized services through [a] head office, which closely mirrors AutoCanada's operating rhythm, will be an excellent addition to our executive team,” Antony said in a release.

Thorpe previously steered AutoNation’s operations across several markets in the Mid…

<!--*/ */ /*-->*/ Disney exec: Automakers need to stir emotions

DETROIT — As vehicles become more automated, how can automakers make sure they're still making something that stirs emotions in their customers?

It's a question some in the industry have been looking to address during a period of unprecedented change. A potential answer to it was given by perhaps an unlikely source at SAE International's World Congress Experience this week.

Jon Snoddy, the head of show, ride and tech engineering at Walt Disney Imagineering, said the answer lies in telling stories, much in the same way that the ride experiences his team works on for Disney's theme parks are built around stories.

As an example, he pointed to the muscle cars he grew up admiring as a kid in South Carolina. Those cars, as different as they appeared, all said the same thing: They're "fast cars for cool people," he said.

"The reason that Detroit was able to build so many amaz…