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Brulte, mobility strategist and consultant, details how autonomous-vehicle operators can expand profit margins from unique experiences, how providers can provide more seamless charging for EV owners and whether Rivian can challenge Tesla.

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BMW and Volkswagen Group's Audi unit are interested in buying British supercar maker McLaren Automotive Ltd., Automobilwoche reported.

BMW is eyeing the supercar business, while Audi is also looking at McLaren’s Formula 1 racing unit, Automobilwoche said, without specifying where it got the information. BMW will hold talks with Bahrain’s sovereign wealth fund Mumtalakat, which controls McLaren, at the beginning of next month, according to the report. Automobilwoche is a sibling publication of Automotive News.

Spokespeople for BMW and Audi didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment outside regular business hours.

McLaren has been attempting to repair its finances following the impact of the pandemic. In July, the Woking, England-based company raised 550 million pounds ($738 million) from existing investors and the sale of preference shares and equity warrants to new backers Ares Management Corp. and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund. It also r…

Editor's note: This story is part of a special report on advanced driver-assist systems running in the Nov. 15 edition.

Advanced driver-assistance systems such as adaptive cruise control are less likely to be in use on curvy roads than on straightaways, according to a study released this summer by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety.

It is a concerning finding since the crashes that such systems are meant to limit are more likely to happen on curvier roads than on straight ones, said Wen Hu, senior research transportation engineer for IIHS.

"The safety benefit would be maximized if drivers could use [the systems] or these systems could work on these sharper curves," Hu said.

The study drew on test data from the Advanced Vehicle Technology Consortium at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology based on how 39 drivers used 2016 Land Rover Range Rover Evoque and 2017 Volvo S90 vehicles over the course of four weeks. Bo…

TOKYO — Mazda's upcoming CX-50 crossover, designed specifically for American drivers, could be the brand's new hero nameplate, delivering record U.S. sales as Mazda moves up market.

The entry, to be built at a new factory in Alabama, is envisioned boosting North American volume by 150,000, an impressive 34 percent surge over this year's expected sales total.

Discussing the upcoming model while announcing Mazda Motor Corp.'s financial results last week, CEO Akira Marumoto said the CX-50 will play a crucial role in securing long-term profitability at the low-volume Japanese player. Mazda will release fresh details about the CX-50 in the United States on Monday, Nov. 15, Marumoto said.

But he teased some specs, saying the CX-50 was developed for U.S. market tastes with a wider tread and bigger cargo room. On the outside, it is expected to be around the size of Mazda's CX-5 crossover, which is currently the automaker's best-selling vehicle in the U.S.

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Elon Musk and RJ Scaringe are getting a lot of attention these days. As well they should. Lifting electric vehicle startups from nothing into something is no small feat.

But companies tasked with steering a legacy business into an uncertain future would do well to keep an eye on Toshihiro Mibe.

In his seven months at the helm of Honda Motor Co., the 60-year-old engineer is shaking up the automaker in a manner reminiscent of the way Honda shook the world in the 1970s with its CVCC engine.

Just take a look at the story on Page 1 of the Nov. 15 issue of Automotive News. It's based on our first one-on-one interview with the new chief executive. Among the key points:

Honda, the first Japanese car company to build vehicles in the U.S., is now the first Japanese automaker to pledge to become gasoline-free by 2040. As part of that goal, it will introduce its own dedicated EV platform and solid-state batteries in the second half of this decade. It is abando…

TOKYO — Honda Motor Co. has long thrived on a reputation for stubborn industry independence, cutting-edge engineering and — perhaps most of all — near-bulletproof engines deployed in everything from airplanes and race cars to lawnmowers.

But today's satisfied driver of a Honda Civic or Acura NSX may hardly recognize the Japanese automaker in 20 years under a radical revolution being led by recently installed CEO Toshihiro Mibe.

If his transformation succeeds, Honda Motor Co. will take a page from Elon Musk's SpaceX and start making rockets. Honda will drop its long-standing aversion to tie-ups with other companies and possibly combine with new partners, even tech companies outside the automotive world.

Honda will also ditch its famed combustion engines for full-electric or hydrogen fuel cell systems. And in this divergent future, Honda — following an industry trend — may even sell fewer vehicles than today, as the business model …

Advanced driver-assistance systems are the building blocks of self-driving vehicles and useful tools for human-controlled cars — as long as the human is paying attention.

ALONG FOR THE RIDE: ADVANCED DRIVER ASSISTANCE SYSTEMS

Advanced driver-assistance systems are the building blocks of self-driving vehicles and useful tools for human-controlled cars — as long as the human is paying attention.

WASHINGTON -- NHTSA said it is looking into a consumer report that a Tesla Model Y was involved in an accident while using the company's Full Self-Driving Beta software.

The owner of a 2021 Tesla Model Y reported to the auto safety agency that on Nov. 3 in Brea, Calif., the vehicle was in FSD Beta mode "and while taking a left turn the car went into the wrong lane and I was hit by another driver in the lane next to my lane."

The car "gave an alert half way through the turn" and the driver tried to assume control "but the car by itself took control and forced itself into the incorrect lane," the report says. The car was severely damaged on the driver side, the owner added.

"NHTSA is aware of the consumer complaint in question and is in communication with the manufacturer to gather additional information," an NHTSA spokesperson told Reuters on Friday.

Tesla did not immediately comment.

Earlier this month, Tesla recalled nearly 12,000 U.S. v…

The numbers told a stark story to Helmi Felfel. How many unread emails were in his inbox? More than 5,000. How many unread texts were on his phone? Zero.

In the midst of rethinking his marketing and advertising plans, Felfel, president of Planet Automotive Group, realized he needed to move beyond traditional outreach and include texting in his efforts to better engage customers across his three Charlotte, N.C.-area dealerships.

"You can call them, and they'll put you on 'ignore,' " Felfel said. "You can leave them a voicemail, and they won't listen to it. You can send an email, and they won't open it. People are busy. I know I am. So to ask people to dedicate a certain amount of time to read an email or talk to somebody? Doesn't happen. But on a text — on their own terms — they seem to want to make it happen."

Over the past year, he has been utilizing a digital advertising solution called Chatterspot that has served as a fresh advertising avenue for hi…

Editor's note: This story is part of a special report on advanced driver-assist systems running in the Nov. 15 edition.

WASHINGTON — U.S. auto safety regulators could be laying the groundwork for closer scrutiny of advanced driver-assistance systems after years of forgoing a regulatory route for these Level 2 automated functions, vehicle safety and technology experts say.

NHTSA — amid an ongoing investigation into Tesla's Autopilot system after a series of crashes involving the electric vehicle maker's models and emergency vehicles — has begun piecing together a potentially more active and assertive approach to examining the safety and efficacy of driver-assist technologies offered by Tesla and other major automakers.

The agency has not yet issued specific regulations or performance standards for such systems, but actions by NHTSA in light of the investigation may signal a sea change, the experts told Automotive News.

Since opening the formal saf…

Magna International Inc. didn't get the blockbuster autonomous-driving technology deal it wanted this summer. But CEO Swamy Kotagiri indicated the Canadian megasupplier remains unfazed.

Kotagiri, 52, in his first year leading Magna, said North America's biggest auto supplier and the world's fourth largest will soldier on with its strategy on advanced driver-assistance systems, even after its bid for Swedish tech supplier Veoneer got snatched out from under him by a rival offer from Qualcomm.

Expect Magna to continue investing significantly in its existing portfolio to win new business from automakers while continuing to keep an eye out for acquisitions and partnerships that make sense for the company, he said.

"We have a really good business in terms of having the sensor suite, whether it's the cameras, the radar, the lidar, the domain controllers and the software capability," he said. "And we always have said that if there's an opportunity to augment …

MIMASAKA, Japan – Toyota marshalled corporate allies this weekend to form a Team Japan dedicated to keeping internal combustion engines alive on the road to carbon neutrality even as rivals continue to gravitate toward battery electric vehicles.

Under the initiative, kicked off Nov. 13 by Toyota Motor Corp., a coalition of five Japanese companies will explore new, greener fueling options for internal combustion.

The push brings together Toyota Motor Corp., Subaru Corp. and Mazda Motor Corp., as well as motorcycle makers Kawasaki Heavy Industries and Yamaha Motor.

The companies announced the initiative at a joint press conference at Okayama International Circuit, a racetrack in western Japan where Toyoda was scheduled to drive a Toyota Corolla race car specially equipped with a hydrogen burning engine in Super Taikyu Series endurance race.

The five companies said they will:

Participate in races using carbon-neutral fuels Explore the use of hyd…