Trade News

Mills Automotive Group of Charlotte, N.C., has purchased three dealerships in Hampton, Va., from Tysinger Motor Co., owned by Mark Tysinger.

The acquisition, which closed on Aug. 31, included Mercedes-Benz of Hampton, Audi Hampton and Tysinger Hyundai-Genesis, plus a Mercedes-Benz Sprinter commercial van franchise.

The Tysinger dealership business started nearly 100 years ago when John Tysinger, great-grandfather of Mark Tysinger, opened a General Motors dealership in 1926. Tysinger, in a statement, said it wanted to find a buyer to enhance its long-standing legacy in the community.

"These franchises complement our growing dealership group," Damian Mills, CEO of Mills Automotive, said in a statement. "His [Mark Tysinger's] stellar mix of franchises in the diverse and growing Hampton Roads region is a perfect fit for our continued geographic and brand expansion."

The group of stores will now operate as Classic Hampton Au…

DETROIT — Ford Motor Co. will extend downtime at its Kansas City Assembly Plant in Claycomo, Mo., to a fourth-straight week because of the ongoing global semiconductor shortage.

The automaker informed employees Wednesday that both the pickup and van sides of the plant will be shuttered until Sept. 20. Workers there build the bestselling F-150 pickup as well as the Transit van.

The pickup side of the plant has been down since Aug. 23.

The chip shortage has greatly impacted production of some of Ford's most important nameplates.

The company has said it plans to work through "most" of some 60,000 to 70,000 unfinished vehicles that are sitting on lots around assembly plants by the end of the third quarter.

DETROIT — Ford Motor Co. has temporarily halted the scheduling of new Maverick hybrid pickup orders beyond the units it has already sold due to a parts availability issue, the automaker confirmed Wednesday.

Ford is currently building both configurations of the Maverick — the standard hybrid and optional 2.0-liter EcoBoost four-cylinder gasoline-only variant — at its Hermosillo, Mexico, plant to fulfill its current order bank. The vehicle is scheduled to launch on time later this month. However, the Maverick Truck Club owners forum posted a memo the automaker allegedly sent dealers earlier this week that the production of future Maverick hybrid orders will not be scheduled "until further notice."

Ford, which did not confirm the dealer memo, said in a statement that both the Maverick hybrid and EcoBoost variants will soon be headed to dealer showrooms and noted that customers can currently order both trucks from their local dealerships.

"As with any of our…

MUNICH — German supplier giant Continental is counting on the launch of a new business unit dedicated to autonomous mobility to help it become more nimble and more attractive to tech startups it wants to partner with.

The creation will also help make Continental's push deeper into emerging technologies more visible to outsiders and investors, said Frank Petznick, head of Continental's advanced driver-assistance systems.

"The less corporate overhead I have, the faster I can act in terms of partnerships, signing contracts, and also give the partner companies a feeling that they're partnering with this automated mobility unit, not with this big mother ship and really big, administrative corporation," Petznick told Automotive News on the sidelines of the Munich auto show Tuesday.

Continental this year said it would create a dedicated unit for its advanced driver-assistance and autonomous technology, betting that it could grow in that high-tech space even a…

Senol Bayrak, a 17-year Daimler veteran who has done tours of duty in China and Germany, will now lead sales and product management in the U.S.

Bayrak, 43, takes over as vice president of sales and product management at Mercedes-Benz USA, effective Nov. 1. He replaces Adam Chamberlain, who will leave the company after 12 years to pursue opportunities outside parent Daimler, the company said in a statement.

In his most recent role, Bayrak served in Stuttgart as the director of product management for SUV and electric models, as well as market intelligence and competitor analysis.

He will have overall responsibility for Mercedes' U.S. sales, volume planning, distribution operations and product management.

He arrives as the automaker faces tight inventories and product disruptions due to industrywide supply chain challenges.

The global semiconductor shortage has forced Mercedes-Benz to scale back production of V-8 engines for the 2022 model ye…

Applied Materials on Wednesday released two new tools aimed at improving the efficiency of making a new class of chips for electric vehicles.

Applied is the world's largest maker of tools for making semiconductors. The machines announced on Wednesday are designed for chips made from a material called silicon carbide.

Such chips are gaining traction in electric vehicles like those made by Tesla Inc. because they are more efficient and lighter in weight than standard silicon chips for transmitting power from a car's battery to its motors, helping improve range. Companies like Cree Inc. and ON Semiconductor Corp. are investing in making the chips.

Silicon carbide chips are difficult to manufacture because the material is very hard. They are bulk-manufactured on discs called "wafers" that are later sliced into individual chips. But wafers first must be polished perfectly smooth, or the resulting chips will have defects.

Because silicon carbide is so…

Ford Motor Co. is hiring the head of Apple Inc.’s car project away from the iPhone maker.

The automaker said Tuesday that it’s bringing on Doug Field, who’s been a vice president in Apple’s special projects group. Field was a top engineer at Tesla Inc. between two stints at Apple and played a major role launching the Model 3 sedan.

Field joins the automaker as chief advanced technology and embedded systems officer, reporting to President and CEO Jim Farley.

Ford shares reversed a decline on the news to close Tuesday's trading up less than 1 percent to $12.95, while Apple closed up about 1.6 percent to $156.69, off its high for the day.

The hire is a coup for Ford, which has made major strides under Farley in convincing investors it can compete with Tesla and others on electric vehicles and technology. Ford shares have almost doubled since Farley took over in October, after his two predecessors presided over a years-long slump. 

Lotus Tech, which develops cars for the Lotus brand, is working on preliminary plans for an initial public offering in the U.S. or Hong Kong to help fund the transition of the iconic maker of sports and racing cars to an all-electric automaker.

The company is studying a potential IPO as soon as 2023 if sales go well, Group Lotus CEO Feng Qingfeng said in an interview Tuesday. There’s also the possibility that Lotus Cars will list in the U.K., but no timetable has been set, he said. 

Lotus Tech, which broke ground on its global headquarters in the Chinese city of Wuhan last week, is tapping the potential for sports cars in the world’s biggest auto market against a small pool of competitors including Porsche Automobil Holding SE and BMW AG. 

Lotus is part of the auto empire of Li Shufu, who founded Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co. and has long held ambitions of developing top-end sports cars. The unit plays an important role in the group, which …

BEIJING -- Stellantis' Chinese venture with GAC will close one of its two factories in China by next March, GAC told Reuters, as Stellantis restructures operations in the world's biggest auto market where it has struggled to sell cars.

The joint venture, which has capacity to make 328,000 vehicles a year, sold only 12,288 in the first seven months this year, all Jeep-branded utility vehicles.

It will transfer production from Guangzhou to Changsha to "increase (the) utilization rate of plants and lower cost", GAC said in a statement. The Changsha factory has capacity to make 164,000 vehicles a year, still far more than the venture sells.

The joint venture was launched by GAC and Fiat Chrysler, which merged with PSA to become Stellantis.

A Stellantis spokesperson declined to comment.

Besides the GAC partnership, Stellantis operates a joint venture in China with Dongfeng Motor Group, which sold 47,788 cars between January and July.

It…