Trade News

India said it has no plans to cut import duties on electric vehicles, weeks after Tesla Inc. appealed to the government to slash taxes, and its billionaire chief Elon Musk floated the possibility of a local factory once it starts selling wholly-built units from overseas in the world’s second-most-populous nation.

“No such proposal is under consideration in Ministry of Heavy Industries,” junior minister Krishan Pal Gurjar told parliament on Monday, referring to the ministry in charge of making policies for the auto industry. He added that the government is however taking steps to promote the use of electric cars by lowering domestic taxes and adding charging stations.

The reply to lawmakers may be perceived as part of the tug-of-war between Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration, which wants to boost local manufacturing, and Tesla, which is urging India to allow it to import cars more cheaply before it commits to setting up a factory in the country. Tesl…

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates -- Sovereign wealth fund Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) has taken a 4.69 percent stake in QuantumScape Corp., which is developing solid-state lithium metal batteries, a Securities and Exchange Commission filing by the company showed.

QIA's stake in QuantumScape, whose batteries will be used in electric cars, is worth around $446 million at the company's current market value of $9.5 billion, according to Refinitiv Eikon data on Monday.

Gulf sovereign funds have stepped up investments in electric cars, new technologies and renewables, as they diversify their investments away from fossil fuel.

The Public Investment Fund, the sovereign wealth fund of neighboring Saudi Arabia, recently made huge gains through the listing of Lucid Group after it initially invested in the company in 2018. PIF owns 62.7 percent of Lucid.

Five CEOs of publicly traded U.S. automotive companies realized more than $24 million in total compensation last year, according to the Automotive News/Equilar CEO Compensation Study.

Jensen Huang of Nvidia was the highest-earning CEO by far. His compensation totaled $255 million, including a base salary of $1 million and $214.9 million in stock option gains.

General Motors' Mary Barra, who received a $2 million salary, was No. 2 with $40.3 million in total compensation, followed by the CEOs of Illinois Tool Works, Eaton and Uber.

The study analyzed data for 48 companies, including automakers, suppliers and public retailers. Median compensation for the 48 CEOs was $6.4 million in 2020, compared with $7.1 million in 2019.

Among CEOs who have been in their positions for at least two years, median compensation increased 9 percent, said Charlie Pontrelli, senior project manager at Equilar.

The study calculates t…

Building out enough charging infrastructure to meet the expected increase in electric vehicles takes a village.

One key part of that village? Cities.

Cities and municipality-affiliated utilities across the U.S. play a role in complementing infrastructure progress made at the state and regional level, one project site at a time.

While federal, state and regional programs often have access to greater sources of funding, certain city-specific charging problems require city-centered solutions, said Jacob Orenberg, capital projects coordinator at Seattle City Light, a public utility company in Washington.

"There are some barriers to electrification that really only the city can address," Orenberg said.

Seattle presents one particularly unique example. "A lot of our neighborhoods and districts were built before, say, 1950," he said. "As a result, even a lot of the single-family homes here don't actually have…

The first special edition Land Rover Defender arrives this month, priced at $91,350, including shipping. The Defender Trophy Edition sports a wrapped exterior and black exterior pack, air suspension, V-8 engine, deployable roof ladder, front undershield, integrated air compressor and other off-road equipment. Only 220 will be built this year. Buyers get an opportunity to compete in a one-day off-road adventure in Asheville, N.C. The Defender, revived in 2020, has become the brand's second-highest volume vehicle globally behind the Range Rover Evoque.

Honda is at the front end of a major overhaul of its crossover lineup. At the same time, the brand is expected to launch additional hybrid versions of its existing vehicles and add its first mainstream battery-electric crossover in 2024.

Honda vehicles coming to the end of their current design lifecycles include the HR-V subcompact crossover, which is in its first generation from the 2016 model year, as well as the CR-V compact crossover and the Passport and Pilot midsize crossovers. The marque's passenger cars are relatively fresh. The Civic compact was redesigned in both its sedan and hatchback versions this year, and the Accord midsize was freshened for the 2021 model year. Honda discontinued the Fit subcompact hatchback and the Civic coupe last year.

Civic: One of America's favorite entry-level cars for decades, the sedan was redesigned as a 2022 model and is on sale now. The 11th generation of the hatchback will also go on sale this year.

Some trim…

Watch out, Tom Cruise. General Motors might come after you next.

Ted Cruz, too. Who knows how far GM's lawyers will go at this point.

For now, GM — despite having failed to get any traction yet with its 2019 racketeering lawsuit against Fiat Chrysler Automobiles — is now burning bridges with its other crosstown rival, Ford Motor Co.

At issue is Ford's decision to call its upcoming hands-free driving technology "BlueCruise."

The lawsuit, filed July 23, calls BlueCruise "a brazen attempt" by Ford to take advantage of positive press about GM's hands-free Super Cruise technology and Cruise, the San Francisco company GM bought in 2016.

BlueCruise, the complaint says, is "far less advanced than Cruise's technology and thus likely to yield an inferior consumer experience, with the potential for comfort and safety issues."

Ford called the suit "meritless and frivolous," saying the name is a reference to its Blue Oval logo and cruise control…

DETROIT — Fiat Chrysler Automobiles wasn't an early contender in the electric vehicle race, leaving its successor, Stellantis, to play catch-up. But given the slow development of the EV market, dealers and analysts say the automaker's timing could turn out to be just right.

It wasn't long ago when FCA CEO Sergio Marchionne was questioning the business case of battery-electric models, while making Alfa Romeo, Jeep and Maserati the center of the company's EV strategy in a five-year plan introduced just weeks before his 2018 death. Marchionne declared that the Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid demonstrated how the company could electrifyits portfolio, with such plug-in hybrids being the focus and fully electrified options becoming part of the mix for Jeep and Maserati by 2022.

Marchionne was preparing to conservatively ramp up FCA's electric presence as competitors pursued more aggressive plans. After FCA merged with PSA group to form Stellantis in Januar…

SUNDANCE, Utah — Nissan helped birth the smaller pickup segment in the U.S. in the 1970s and '80s and doubled down on it with the introduction of the midsize Frontier in 1997.

But then an odd thing happened: Nissan allowed its bread-and-butter pickup to go from 2004 until now without a redesign.

During that time, Nissan's Detroit competitors Ford and General Motors exited midsize pickups, and then returned, while Nissan watched its segment share shrivel from a peak of 29.3 percent in 2014 to 6.1 percent last year.

Nissan now wants back in the ring.

A new-generation Frontier, which arrives at dealerships in early September as a 2022 model, is ready to rumble, with larger proportions and a rugged design aimed at the heart of the lifestyle pickup segment.

Dealers are relieved to get a competitive pickup in the showroom.

"The Frontier has gotten long in the tooth, and people just buy them because…