Trade News

As the global microchip shortage drags on, depleted dealership lots are sending some customers into a frenzy.

When one shopper at Burns Chevrolet in Rock Hill, S.C., saw another customer peering into the Tahoe that he wanted to buy, he began shouting at her.

"The woman only wanted to look inside," said Claude Burns, president of Burns Chevrolet, Burns Cadillac and Burns Ford of York. "And he's hollering, 'Get away from that truck. I'm buying it.' That was uncomfortable for everybody."

Customer frustration likely will worsen this month as shuttered plants and slowing production lines prevent dealerships from being able to restock.

This week, only four of General Motors' 14 North America assembly plants are scheduled to be online. One Ford F-150 plant is dark, and the other is operating on only one shift. And Toyota Motor Corp. is in the midst of a production cutback that is expected to cost the automaker 360,000 vehicles of output globally this mo…

When the pandemic began last year, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles reviewed its manufacturing processes and work stations to ensure employees would be safe while still churning out quality vehicles.

FCA had a stellar showing in 2020's J.D. Power Initial Quality Study, with Dodge becoming the first domestic brand to lead the rankings and Ram jumping to third place from below average previously. To keep that momentum going, the company would have to adjust to a health crisis that reshaped the factory environment — and based on this year's study, it did just that.

Ram claimed the No. 1 spot for the first time, followed by Dodge in second place. Jeep joined its stablemates in the upper tier by moving up three spots to a tie for eighth.

The success was a product of both vehicle design and discipline in the assembly plants, said Mark Champine, head of North America customer experience at Stellantis, the entity formed by FCA's January merger with PSA Group. Read more

Tesla set an aggressive timetable for its $1.1 billion greenfield assembly plant in Austin, Texas. The electric vehicle maker announced the project only last summer but vows to start production there by the end of this year.

To meet that target, which is part of a plan to quickly launch its Cybertuck, Tesla also must draw suppliers into the Austin area. Supplier plant investments are expected to boom in the region. But so far, few parts companies have declared their intentions.

When asked during a July earnings call about Tesla's ability to stay on plan and expand production, Tesla CEO Elon Musk was philosophical. "Things will move as fast as the slowest part in the entire supply chain," he said, "which goes all the way back to raw materials — lithium and nickel and that kind of thing."

Some suppliers recently have arrived in Tesla's new Texas corridor, although they are not specifying that the secretive Tesla is the reason.

Among the projects t…

The auto industry’s shortage of semiconductors grew still worse last week, causing AutoForecast Solutions to ratchet up its worst-case scenario once again.

The forecaster now estimates the global industry will lose more than 8.5 million vehicles from its collective production plans before the crisis is over. 

That estimate is 440,000 vehicles higher than its outlook one week earlier.

The shortage shows no sign of easing soon, and automakers in North America, Asia and Europe last week continued to warn of further negative impact.

General Motors said it will cut output at its light-duty pickup plants in Fort Wayne, Ind., and Silao, Mexico, because of inadequate supplies of chips.

In Europe, Daimler CEO Ola Källenius told Automotive News’ German-language sibling publication, Automobilwoche, that “our sales in the third quarter are likely to be noticeably lower than in the second quarter” as a result of chip shortage-related factory cuts.…

The battery cell "is tomorrow's combustion chamber," Porsche CEO Oliver Blume declared at parent Volkswagen Group's Power Day.

The VW event, which came not long after Tesla's Battery Day in September 2020, marked the first of a series of announcements from European automakers that laid out their plans to replace internal combustion engines with battery- driven propulsion.

They included VW's Power Day in March, Renault's eWays ElectroPop event in June, and Stellantis' EV Day and Daimler's EV strategy announcement, both in July.

The automakers used the events to expand on how they were going to meet the 468 gigawatt-hours of battery cell capacity IHS Markit estimates will be needed in Europe to meet the European Union's proposed 55 percent CO2 reduction target by 2030.

The promise of new battery plants, mostly with cell partners, was the concrete result of €2.9 billion ($3.5 billion) of investments from EU countries promis…

TOKYO — When its newfangled e-Palette people mover hit a visually impaired judo wrestler in the athlete village for the 2020 Paralympic Games last month, Toyota proposed a rather ironic safety solution for a supposedly self-driving vehicle: more humans and more human oversight.

The boxcarlike shuttle buses — a public display of Toyota's interest in autonomous vehicles — each got a second safety operator. And the number of crossing guards directing traffic and protecting pedestrians was more than tripled along the e-Palette's route.

Toyota President Akio Toyoda also quickly apologized for the accident and just as quickly issued a reality check about the rudimentary state of today's autonomous driving technology. "I don't think it's at all realistic yet that self-driving cars can travel normally on ordinary roads," he said afterward.

Toyoda's appraisal may be a buzzkill for an industry that's furiously pursuing a new wave of futuristic technologies. But …

DETROIT — A gasoline leak at Ford Motor Co.'s Flat Rock, Mich., assembly plant is likely the cause of vapors and gasoline found in the city's sewer system, prompting a state of emergency in the area, southwest of Detroit, the company said.

The factory, where the Ford Mustang is built, is closed through the Labor Day weekend as previously planned while Ford continues to investigate the matter. The leak and Ford's role were first reported late Friday by The Detroit News.

"We take our responsibilities as a corporate citizen and to protect the environment seriously," Bob Holycross, Ford's vice president for sustainability, environment and safety engineering, said in a statement. "We've been working with city, state and federal agencies over the last several days to understand and address the issue in Flat Rock."

The News, citing the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy, said an estimated 1,000 to 3,000 gallons of unleaded gasoline are t…

The Tesla owner killed along with a friend last spring in a fiery crash outside Houston had almost twice his state’s legal limit of alcohol in his system, an autopsy report first obtained by Bloomberg News shows.

The gruesome deaths of anesthesiologist William Varner, 59, and Everette Talbot, 69, in the wealthy neighborhood of The Woodlands on April 17 drew widespread attention because first responders found the driver’s seat was unoccupied.

Initial comments from local police said that “no one” was driving, which generated news headlines about a “driverless” Tesla and speculation on whether the Autopilot driver-assistance system on Varner’s car was engaged at the time of the crash. Tesla shares fell the next trading day and two federal agencies -- the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board -- launched probes.  

The owner’s alcohol level at the time of the crash adds complexity to a case that has …

Many employees at Planet Ford-Lincoln in Spring, Texas, believe they are their co-workers' keepers.

So much so that it led them to bankroll a stash of cash they call the Superfund. Employees can voluntarily contribute $10 per month, and those participants can withdraw funds during a personal financial crisis — think sickness, death or a significant other losing a job.

The money doesn't have to be repaid, but the need must withstand the scrutiny of a panel of co-workers empowered to approve or deny a request.

Since its creation in 2003, the fund has returned more than $100,000 to participating employees facing troubles such as mortgage foreclosures, hurricane-damaged homes and medical emergencies. The largest single payout was $8,000 for funeral expenses, said Shawn Burns, Planet Ford-Lincoln's general manager and operating partner.

Burns says the fund is welcome relief for participating workers who need it and satisfies employees' desire to help…

Vehicle electrification is not only dominating the conversation about the auto industry's future, it's also now dominating North American factory investment.

In the first six months of this year, 95 percent of all automaker plant site investment in North America was for electric vehicle-related products, representing more than $12 billion.

That's up from 65 percent of investment in the two previous years, according to the Book of Deals, a database that monitors new plants and manufacturing investment projects.

"We're seeing an acceleration," said Bernard Swiecki, director of the Automotive Communities Partnership, which maintains the database to help states and communities track economic development opportunities in the auto industry. "And when you consider that the Biden administration is committed to EV technology and CO2 reduction, we have to assume the industry's investment in that area is only going to increase. You have to wonder if people might …