Trade News

PALMER, Texas -- Self-driving startup Aurora says it has discovered a path to turn costly self-driving vehicles into a profitable business, showcasing its technology to investors this week ahead of a public listing it hopes will provide some $2 billion in additional funding.

The move comes as several autonomous trucking companies prepare to launch driverless routes in the coming years and begin signing up industry partners and customers in an effort to turn long-elusive self-driving into a profitable reality.

Unlike some of its competitors, Aurora wants to provide both autonomous freight trucking and robotaxi services, saying the combination will lower costs, provide greater revenue streams and allow technology transfer.

"Trucking allows us to build a profitable, scalable business that funds the further development of ride-hailing and brings down the cost of hardware," Sterling Anderson, Aurora's co-founder and chief product officer, said in an intervie…

WASHINGTON -- Rohit Chopra was officially confirmed as director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, signaling a return to more aggressive oversight of financial services companies at the agency.  

The U.S. Senate voted Thursday 50-48 to approve Chopra’s nomination on party lines. As CFPB director, he’ll face intense pressure from progressive Democrats, who expect him to revive the agency they say was put to sleep during the Trump administration. If he succeeds in turning the agency around, life may get less pleasant for auto dealerships, banks, credit bureaus, credit-card companies and student and payday lenders.

“The industry didn’t have to dedicate any mindshare whatsoever to the CFPB’s activities for nearly four years,” said Isaac Boltansky, a policy analyst at Compass Point Research & Trading. “But with Chopra taking the chair, the bureau suddenly jumps up to the top of the worry list for most consumer finance companies.”

Chopra ha…

WASHINGTON — Top U.S. executives from 12 international automakers are urging the U.S. House of Representatives to support broader tax credits for electric vehicles in the Democrats' $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill.

In a letter sent Thursday to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, executives from automakers including American Honda Motor Co., Toyota Motor North America and Volkswagen Group of America called for "policies that offer incentives to all electric vehicles made by all American auto workers" and to oppose "policies that slow progress toward meeting our nation's climate goals."

The letter — which includes signatures from Hyundai Motor North America CEO Jose Muñoz and Subaru of America CEO Tom Doll — comes after the House Ways and Means Committee this month advanced a proposal that would give consumers an extra incentive to buy union-made EVs.

The proposal — led by Rep. Dan Kildee, D-Mich., and slated for inclusion in the reconciliation bill — would bo…

A new era of robotaxis providing commercial service on California’s public roads inched closer to reality Thursday.

Waymo and Cruise received permits from the California Department of Motor Vehicles to launch such services.

They join delivery-tech company Nuro on the list of companies approved for commercial deployments.

"It brings us one step closer to achieving our mission to make transportation safer, better, and more affordable in cities with our fleet of all-electric, self-driving and shared vehicles," Rob Grant, senior vice president of government affairs and social impact at Cruise, said in a statement.

The permits received Thursday allow Waymo and Cruise to charge money and receive compensation from operating an autonomous vehicle. They restricts the companies to operating in designated portions of the Bay Area.

Using AVs for paid commercial passenger service requires further authorization from the California Public Utilities…

Toyota Motor Corp. and Mazda Motor Corp.'s joint venture factory in Alabama plans to hire 1,700 additional employees as it ramps up production, the companies said on Thursday.

Mazda Toyota Manufacturing, which has started making the 2022 Toyota Corolla Cross, expects to have 4,000 workers in total by next year, when production of the yet-to-be-announced Mazda vehicle will also begin.

The JV expects to produce 150,000 future Mazda and 150,000 Toyota crossovers annually.

Last year, Toyota and Mazda increased their investment in the JV by $830 million to $2.3 billion.

WASHINGTON — When Mary Nichols thinks about a transition to electric vehicles, she realizes there are still more questions than answers.

But despite big policy issues ranging from EV charging infrastructure and affordability to building out a domestic supply chain, the former chair of the California Air Resources Board says she's optimistic — and "very much so."

"The idea that the platform — the propulsion system — will be either a battery or a fuel cell is just widely accepted now," Nichols, 76, told Automotive News. "That's a huge change from just a couple of years ago."

Nichols, who retired as California's top environmental official last December after leading the clean air agency since 2007, is now co-chair of the Commission on the Future of Mobility along with Ford Motor Co. CEO Jim Farley. The commission — a group of industry, tech and policy leaders — also is trying to grapple with EV-related questions as it works to inform policy that prioritiz…

The U.S. Justice Department said Wednesday it settled a lawsuit against American Honda Finance Corp., in which it alleged the auto financing entity broke the law by not refunding certain lease payments to service members who ended their vehicle leases early.

The unit will pay more than $1.58 million to 714 affected service members, according to a Justice Department release. The settlement also requires the company to pay $64,715 to the U.S. Treasury to "adopt new policies and implement new training requirements."

American Honda Finance, headquartered in Torrance, Calif., provides retail financing in the U.S. for Honda and Acura vehicles. In a complaint, the Justice Department said the company specifically failed to provide refunds of vehicle trade-in credit that was applied toward capitalized cost reduction.

The department said that violated the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act, a law enacted in 2003 that provides financial protections to active duty serv…

When Asbury Automotive Group Inc.'s pending acquisition of Larry H. Miller Dealerships is complete, Asbury CEO David Hult will have gone from leading the industry's smallest publicly traded dealership group to one of the largest.

The $3.2 billion megadeal for Larry H. Miller's 61 stores announced Wednesday positions Asbury to spread its dealership network coast to coast, add thousands of new customers for its Clicklane digital retailing platform and operate its own finance-and-insurance company.

"We believe that this acquisition is truly transformative for Asbury," Hult said in a statement.

In addition to the $5.7 billion in expected annual revenue from Larry H. Miller, Asbury also announced Wednesday that it has stores representing another $900 million in annual revenue under contract. It's the second supersized deal since Hult was promoted to the CEO post in 2018, following Asbury's $735 purchase of eight Park Place luxury dealerships in Texas last ye…

ZURICH -- ABB has launched the world's fastest electric-car charger, the Swiss engineering company said, as it presses ahead with plans to float the business which could be valued at around $3 billion.

The company's new Terra 360 modular charger can charge up to four vehicles at once and can fully charge any EV within 15 minutes, the company said in a statement on Thursday.

The device, which can deliver 62 miles of range in less than 3 minutes, will be available in Europe by the end of the year, the company said.

The U.S., Latin America and the Asia Pacific regions are due to follow in 2022.

CEO Bjorn Rosengren said in July that investor materials for the IPO of its EV charging business will be ready in the fourth quarter of this year, with a potential flotation targeted for early 2022.

ABB has seen rising demand for chargers and has sold more than 460,000 units across more than 88 markets since it entered the e-mobility business in 2010.…

Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey warned car buyers Wednesday to be aware of dealers who may not accurately advertise vehicle prices or honor those prices.

Healey's office issued an advisory in response to an uptick in consumer complaints that allege deceptive pricing practices by dealers. About 74 such complaints were filed in the past year.

The office said it received reports of some dealerships advertising specific prices online but denying them once interested car buyers got to the store. In some cases, dealers had confirmed the advertised price in an email, the complaints said. Other car buyers reported dealers not honoring buyout provisions in lease agreements.

"Purchasing a vehicle is a significant financial investment for many individuals and families," Healey said in a statement. "After a surge in complaints to my office, we're making sure consumers are aware of their rights under the law, and that auto dealerships know our office will…

The $3.2 billion acquisition of Larry H. Miller Dealerships will give Asbury Automotive Group Inc. a highly profitable in-house F&I products provider.

Total Care Auto produces about $240 million in revenue, has about 2 million contracts open and delivers EBITDA margins of more than 20 percent, Asbury said in announcing the deal. Asbury CEO David Hult said on an analyst call Wednesday that Total Care Auto's margins in some cases can exceed 30 percent.

And 90 percent of Total Care Auto's claims wind up with the work being done at locations within the Larry H. Miller group.

"It's really a great business model," Hult said.

So Larry H. Miller — and now Asbury — is basically paying itself back whenever customers use the products for free repairs and service.

"That money all stays in-house, or a good majority of it," Hult said.

Scaling Total Care Auto at Asbury "really puts a nice business model toge…

DETROIT — General Motors plans to launch Ultifi, an in-vehicle customer experience platform, in 2023, aiming to make its vehicles smarter and more personalized, the automaker said Wednesday.

The platform is a critical part of GM's plan to develop a wider profit net through technology and software and subscription-based services that extend beyond the vehicle purchase. GM and other traditional automakers could boost their revenue as much as 30 to 40 percent with service businesses in the next five to 10 years, analysts told Automotive News in March.

"Today, cars are enabled by software. With Ultifi, they are going to be defined by it," Scott Miller, GM vice president, software-defined vehicle, told reporters Wednesday.

Ultifi will deliver features, apps and services to customers via over-the-air updates. The system builds on GM's electric vehicle architecture, called the Vehicle Intelligence Platform. It will be available on new electric and gasoline-powe…