Trade News

Auto retail giant Lithia Motors Inc. this week expanded its portfolio of high-end brands, while two other dealers made single-store purchases in December and in earlier transactions.

Here's a look at the deals involving exotic, import and domestic brands. One transaction involved a group ranked on Automotive News' top 150 dealership groups list.

Lithia acquires first Ferrari dealershipLithia Motors Inc. acquired its first Ferrari dealership on Monday when it bought Algar Ferrari of Philadelphia in Bryn Mawr, Pa., according to Bill Scrivner of Pinnacle Mergers & Acquisitions, a Frisco, Texas, buy-sell firm representing Lithia in the transaction.

The dealership was renamed Ferrari of Philadelphia, Scrivner said.

Lithia bought the dealership from Aleks Vekselberg, who had owned it since 2012, according to the store's website. The store dates to 1964.

Vekselberg's father is Russian billionaire Viktor Vekselb…

STOCKHOLM -- Volvo said Friday it had launched an investigation into the theft of some R&D data which could impact the company's operation.

"Investigations so far confirm that a limited amount of the company's R&D property has been stolen during the intrusion," the Swedish carmaker said in a statement.

It added that "there may be an impact on the company's operation", but did not specify what that might be.

Volvo said it did not see an impact on the security of its customers' cars or their personal data.

"Volvo Cars is conducting its own investigation and working with third-party specialist to investigate the property theft," the company said. The automaker said it had implemented security countermeasures to prevent further access to its property, while notifying relevant authorities.

In October, as Smith Automotive Group was in the process of renewing its cyber insurance policy, the group's controller got an email from CFO Karen Kulinich asking her to wire $190,000 from a specific account.

The invoice and the wording of the email looked legitimate, like something Kulinich would have written. Only Kulinich didn't send the email. She was at a lunch meeting and had communicated that she would be unavailable for a couple of hours. When Kulinich later checked her phone, she said, "that's when both of us just froze."

"She was one click away from sending $190,000," Kulinich said.

The incident prompted the four-store Nissan group in Georgia to talk about adopting multifactor authentication.

Days later, Kulinich said, Smith's cyber insurance provider said the group would be required to have such authentication in place to obtain coverage. It was the first time the carrier had required that particular cybersecurity protocol, she said.…

China’s new light-vehicle market contracted for the seventh month in November amid lingering semiconductor shortages and other supply-chain disruptions.

Sales of sedans, crossovers, SUVs, multipurpose vehicles and minibuses dropped 4.7 percent to 2.19 million last month from a year earlier, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers said.

Overall November sales beat CAAM's expectations, CAAM spokesperson Chen Shihua said, pointing to the impact of falling raw materials prices and an easing of power shortages that had halted output at many factories in prior months.

He said the semiconductor shortage, however, would continue to pressure the auto industry in December, although auto demand would be steady as the economy improves.

Through November, new light-vehicle sales rose 7.1 percent to 19.06 million on the back of a strong first-quarter rebound.

A sharp contraction in the new commercial-vehicle market continued after China raised …

TOKYO -- Toyota has expanded production stoppages at some factories in Japan because of a shortage of components shipped from parts plants in southeast Asia.

The latest halts will cut car output by 9,000 vehicles when added to cuts announced on Thursday, affecting production of Lexus models and the four-wheel-drive Toyota Land Cruiser, Toyota said in a press release.

Although limited, the cuts come as Toyota tries to make up for production lost to earlier supply-chain disruptions in Malaysia and Vietnam that forced it to trim vehicle output even as demand for cars in markets such as China rebounded as coronavirus lockdowns ended.

The automaker said it is sticking to an annual production target set in September to build 9 million vehicles by the end of March.

"We would like to maintain 9 million units, but we will keep a close eye on the situation," a Toyota spokesperson said.

Volvo Cars and Northvolt have closed a $3.3-billion deal that the automaker said secures its supply of sustainable, state-of-the-art battery cells for its next-generation full-electric cars.

The joint venture includes an R&D center, which will start operations in 2022, in Gothenburg, Sweden, making Volvo one of the few automotive brands to make battery cell development and production part of its end-to-end engineering capabilities, the automaker said in a statement. on Friday.

The battery R&D center will be joined by a new cell manufacturing facility that will produce powerplants for Volvo and its subsidiary, Polestar.

The two Swedish companies are in the final phase of selecting a location in Europe for the factory, which will have annual capacity of up to 50 gigawatt hours and the ability to supply batteries to half a million cars a year by 2026.

The exact location of the plant is expected to be confirmed in early 2022, with construction…

DETROIT — General Motors plans to build electric vehicles at price points for all consumers, not just luxury buyers, and a government incentive could help accelerate EV adoption, CEO Mary Barra said Thursday.

Many EV startups cater to a luxury, high-spending market, but GM's portfolio will run the gamut, with a Chevrolet Equinox-size model for under $30,000, for example, Barra said at an Automotive Press Association event here.

Her comments come after Tesla CEO Elon Musk this week said he opposed the Build Back Better bill backed by the Biden administration, even though the legislation would reinstate a $7,500 credit for Tesla and GM and scrap limits on the number of EVs that are eligible per manufacturer. The bill also includes an extra $4,500 credit if the vehicle is assembled by union workers in the U.S. – a provision opposed by many non-U.S.-based automakers.

Barra didn't comment specifically on the credits in that bill.

She said consumers sh…

CDK Global Inc. agreed to drop its legal challenge to a state law in Arizona that gives auto retailers more control of data inside dealership management systems, saying the company instead will focus on its software products.

U.S. District Judge G. Murray Snow last week signed an order dismissing CDK's claims in the case following a stipulation by the parties, including CDK and DMS rival Reynolds and Reynolds Co., Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich and the Arizona Automobile Dealers Association, which intervened in the case, according to a court filing.

Privately held Reynolds and Reynolds is the sole remaining plaintiff in the case. The two DMS giants brought the lawsuit in 2019.

"We want to focus our efforts on continuing to provide innovative software solutions to our dealers in Arizona and elsewhere," CDK spokesman Tony Macrito said via email.

"The court has provided some direction as to how the statute is intended to and should operate," …

Vehicle output at General Motors’ partnership with SAIC Motor Corp., which builds Cadillac, Buick and Chevrolet cars and light trucks, slipped for the eighth straight month as a result of the global semiconductor crunch. 

November production at SAIC-GM fell 16 percent to 132,135 units, according to SAIC, a Shanghai-listed company.

Behind a rebound of 129 percent in the first quarter compared with the same coronavirus-stricken period in 2020, output at the joint venture through November has dipped 5.4 percent to some 1.17 million.

Last month, wholesale volume at SAIC-GM also contracted for the eighth-straight month, dropping 17 percent to 137,026, according to SAIC.

Despite an 87-percent rebound in the first quarter, year-to-date wholesale volume at the partnership declined 8.1 percent to roughly 1.17 million.

GM’ retail sales in China declined 19 percent to some 623,000 in the third quarter, including retail volume at SAIC-GM-Wuling. I…

DETROIT — General Motors plans to build the Chevrolet Silverado EV starting in early 2023, a top executive said Thursday.

Doug Parks, executive vice president for global product development, purchasing and supply chain, provided production timing at Deutsche Bank's AutoTech Conference. Automotive News reported in July that the Silverado EV was expected to go on sale in 2023.

GM plans to reveal the electric pickup during CEO Mary Barra's keynote speech at CES on Jan. 5.

The Silverado EV will compete with a cascade of upcoming electric pickups, including the Ford F-150 Lightning, Rivian's R1T and the Tesla Cybertruck.

Production timing for the Silverado EV could lag the launch of the F-150 Lightning by about a year. Lightning output is slated to begin this spring.

When Ford closed the reservation system for the Lightning on Wednesday, the automaker said it booked nearly 200,000 reservations.

The Sil…

WASHINGTON — The Alliance for Automotive Innovation on Thursday unveiled 10 recommendations for public charging stations as the U.S. begins to plan for a nationwide infrastructure for electric vehicles.

The recommendations come after President Joe Biden last month signed into law a roughly $1 trillion infrastructure bill. The bipartisan legislation includes $7.5 billion for EV charging stations and $65 billion for upgrades to the nation's electric grid.

The funding for EV infrastructure is an "important down payment to jump-start the public and private investment in a nationwide charging network," the alliance said in a document outlining the charging station attributes. The recommendations are designed to help federal- and state-level investment planning and funding considerations for EV charging across the U.S.

"Achieving ambitious EV sales goals will require effective collaboration and planning across various industries and sectors," John Bozzella, al…

Volkswagen Group said it will reassign responsibility for its China business unit to VW brand chief Ralf Brandstaetter.

The company veteran will take over the role on Aug. 1, 2022, VW said in a statement on Thursday.

Skoda boss Thomas Schaefer will become VW brand CEO. Schaefer will familiarize himself with the VW brand role from April 1 onwards as chief operating officer ahead of taking up the CEO role, VW said.

Brandstaetter, 53, will move to Beijing for the new role, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported on Wednesday.

VW's current China boss, Stephan Woellenstein, will be given a new as-yet unidentified role with the automaker, reports said last month.

China accounts for 40 percent of VW Group's volume, but sales in the world's biggest market are well below targets, with demand for VW's ID full-electric models models much weaker than expected due to the microchip crisis and competition from Tesla and local electric brands such as Nio…