Trade News

More than 200 employees who worked or are working for Fiat Chrysler's U.S. unit will not be considered victims of a long-running scandal that involved the automaker's representatives paying off members of the UAW, a federal judge said Monday.

Judge Paul Borman of the Eastern District of Michigan ruled that the company funneling $3.5 million to the union between 2009 and 2016 did not negatively affect the 234 workers in question in the lawsuit.

FCA US, which is now part of Stellantis, pleaded guilty this year to one count of conspiracy to violate the Labor Management Relations Act. The automaker agreed to pay a $30 million fine and undergo independent compliance monitoring for three years.

The employees alleged that the bribes caused them to receive suboptimal work agreements. Labor negotiations took place within the aforementioned time frame. Stellantis spokeswoman Jodi Tinson declined to comment on the latest ruling.

Th…

DETROIT — BrightDrop, General Motors' electric van-powered goods and delivery service, has appointed executives from Lyft, Postmates and Nio to fill out its leadership team.

BrightDrop has named Anthony Armenta as chief technology officer, Rachad Youssef as chief product officer, Shaluinn Fullove as chief people officer and Steve Hornyak as chief revenue officer, the company said in a statement Tuesday.

The appointments are effective immediately.

"Their robust backgrounds — spanning robotics, autonomy and machine learning — will enable us to accelerate our vision of delivering better cities while helping decarbonize the last mile of delivery," BrightDrop CEO Travis Katz said in the statement.

Armenta, Youssef and Fullove will work out of BrightDrop's San Francisco Bay Area offices, and Hornyak will be based in Atlanta.

BrightDrop plans to launch the EV600 van later this year, initially built by a supplier in Livonia, Mich., b…

Porsche's bestselling people mover is getting a freshening that adds style, substance and capability.

The 2022 Macan compact crossover arrives in U.S. dealerships early next year, starting at $56,250. The Macan S variant, starting at $66,750, and GTS variant, starting at $81,250, will follow in the spring. All prices include a $1,350 shipping fee.

The Macan is a volume driver and a gateway model for converts to the sports car brand. In the U.S., Porsche delivered 11,489 Macans in the first half of the year, up 48 percent from the same period in 2020.

Since the Macan's launch in 2014, Porsche has sold more than 137,000 of the crossovers in America.

Macan sales are likely to receive a further jolt when a battery-powered version silently rolls into the U.S. in the second half of 2023. The electric Macan will be based on Volkswagen Group's Premium Platform Electricrchitecture developed in collaboration with Audi. Like the …

Jeep is traversing greener turf with a new plug-in Wrangler hybrid with 25 miles of electric range.

The 2021 Wrangler 4xe hybrid also heralds Jeep's North America electrification strategy.

The plug-in Wrangler's turbocharged 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine, two electric motors and a TorqueFlite eight-speed automatic transmission deliver a combined 375 hp, an estimated 49 mpg-e and 470 pound-feet of torque. Combined city/highway gasoline fuel economy is rated at 20 mpg.

We've collected some early reviews from the automotive media.

"he Wrangler's integration of gas and electric power is excellent. The 4xe seems to always know where the power should come from and puts that source at the fore with little hesitation. Aside from the lack of engine noise when running in EV mode, it's hard to tell the Wrangler is even a PHEV when under throttle.

"Rather than mounting the motors directly to an axle, engineers attach…

DETROIT — GMC will join the electric pickup fray, executives said Monday.

Duncan Aldred, vice president of global Buick and GMC, told reporters a full-size electric pickup would arrive in "due course." Aldred declined to say whether the pickup would share the Sierra name with its gasoline-powered counterpart.

GMC's confirmation of an electric pickup follows Chevrolet's April announcement that it would build an electric Silverado, powered by GM's proprietary Ultium battery, at GM's Factory Zero plant in Detroit. Forecasters expect GM to also build the GMC pickup at Factory Zero, alongside the 2022 GMC Hummer EV pickup, the 2024 Hummer EV SUV and the Cruise Origin.

GM declined to provide production timing for the full-size pickups, but forecasters expect both to go on sale in 2023, facing a number of competitors, such as the Ford F-150 Lightning, Rivian R1T and Tesla Cybertruck.

WASHINGTON — Fully vaccinated U.S. citizens and permanent residents will be allowed into Canada as of Aug. 9, joined by the rest of the world Sept. 7, federal officials announced Monday — much to the delight of some in the Canadian auto industry — as the country prepares to lower border barriers that were erected to limit the spread of COVID-19.

Officials say the 14-day quarantine requirement will be waived beginning the second week of August for eligible travelers who are currently residing in the United States and have received a full course of a COVID-19 vaccine approved for use in Canada.

“We’re excited to see this as news. This will help certainly ease some of the tension that’s been realized by the companies doing cross-border business,” Jeanine Lassaline-Berglund, president of the Canadian Association of Moldmakers (CAMM) and Automate Canada, which advocates for Canadian manufacturers, told Automotive News Canada moments after the announcement.…

DETROIT -- In the next two years, Chevrolet dealers will add a high-performance Corvette to their lineups.

Chevy plans to launch a supercharged version of its midengine Corvette for the 2023 model year, the brand said in a statement Monday.

The 2023 Corvette Z06 will add racing components to the standard stingray. Chevy plans to share details on availability and launch timing when it reveals the Z06 this fall.

The 2022 Corvette will go on sale this year with an upgraded direct-injection fuel system, improved engine calibration and an enhanced active fuel management range.

Chevy also launched a special-edition racing Corvette last month as the brand returned to the Detroit Grand Prix for the first time in 13 years.

The special edition features Corvette Racing-themed graphics, including a No. 3 on the back of the yellow edition and a No. 4 on the gray edition. Chevy will build 1,000 special-edition models for le…

LOS ANGELES — HAAH Automotive Holdings is ending its seven-year effort to import Chinese vehicles and distribute them through a dedicated U.S. dealership network, CEO Duke Hale told Automotive News.

Hale cited tense U.S.-China relations that scared off potential investors.

The Irvine, Calif., startup will file for bankruptcy Monday after a conference call with prospective dealers, who have paid nonrefundable deposits from $100,000 to several hundred thousand dollars for franchise points in the U.S., Hale said.

"We don't see a way forward right now for Vantas and T-GO," Hale said of the two U.S. brands created to sell vehicles from China's Chery Automobile Co. "There's going to be no cars, there's going to be no parts, there's going to be no revenue," Hale said of the bankruptcy filing.

HAAH pulled the plug after the investors it needed to move forward became increasingly risk averse because of tensions in U.S.-China trade relations, stiff auto ta…

Like many girls talented in math and science, Denise Gray aspired to be a math teacher. “Then in middle school, my math teacher Mr. Oliver told me I should be an engineer — and that I should go to Cass Tech,” she says. That advice changed her life. She did enroll at Cass Tech, a leading math and science public school in Detroit, and she did become an engineer. And today she is president of LG Energy Solution Michigan’s Tech Center, working on the South Korea-based company’s battery business. In 2020, she was named one of Automotive News’ 100 Leading Women in the North American Auto Industry. Gray joined LG Chem in 2010, after nearly 30 years at General Motors. She actually started her GM career as a high school junior; Cass Tech and GM had a vocational program offering students a half-day of school combined with 20 hours of work each week at the GM Tech Center. After high school, Gray went to the GM Institute (now Kettering University) to earn her bachelor’s degree…

One of Jeff Gabbert's first acts as the new vice president of sales at Bird-Kultgen Ford was supposed to be to bring the dealership's sales force together. Instead, he worked to ensure the team members stayed apart.

As he arrived last November, some of the dealership's employees contracted the coronavirus and about 15 others needed to quarantine because of potential exposure. The groups included members of the senior leadership team.

So Gabbert, 39, postponed plans to combine the staff — spread between two buildings on the Waco, Texas, campus — under one roof. He then pivoted to something that carried immediate benefits and may have long-lasting impact. In his first month, he led the rapid development of an entirely virtual sales tower, allowing senior employees who handle paperwork to process documents elsewhere.

"Everyone went home," he said. "They took their computers and worked deals, the whole bit.

"It's been one curveball after another, bu…

The father-son team that smuggled Carlos Ghosn out of Japan in a large musical-equipment case are set to be sentenced Monday for helping Nissan Motor Co.’s former chairman flee trial in 2019.

Prosecutors recommended a sentence of two years and 10 months for Michael Taylor, the father and a former U.S. Green Beret, at a hearing earlier this month. The son, Peter Taylor, should receive a two-year, six-month sentence, they said.

Both have pleaded guilty to charges of aiding Ghosn’s escape to Beirut, a development that was just as shocking as the November 2018 arrest of the auto executive for alleged financial crimes. With Ghosn out of reach — Lebanon doesn’t extradite its citizens — the two have become a proxy for Ghosn and his case. So has Greg Kelly, a former Nissan director who was detained on the same day as his boss and is facing trial in Japan. Ghosn and Kelly have denied the charges.

After spending more than a year in Japan and free on bail, Ghosn ma…