Trade News

China is shaping up to be the first real test of Big Tech’s ambitions in the world of carmaking, with giants from Huawei Technologies Co. to Baidu Inc. plowing almost $19 billion into electric and self-driving vehicle ventures widely seen as the future of transport.

While Apple Inc. has long had plans for its own car and Alphabet Inc. has Waymo, its autonomous driving unit, the size -- and speed -- of the move by China’s tech titans puts them at the vanguard of that broader push. The lure is an industry that’s becoming increasingly high tech as it pivots away from the combustion engine, with sensors and operating systems making cars more like computers, and the prospect of autonomy re-envisioning how people use will them.

As the world’s biggest market for new-energy cars, China is a key battlefield. Established automakers like Volkswagen Group and General Motors Co. are already slogging it out with local upstarts such as market darling Nio Inc. and Xpeng Inc. …

DETROIT — Ford Motor Co. on Monday confirmed its upcoming battery-electric pickup will be called the F-150 Lightning, and it will be unveiled at its world headquarters in Dearborn, Mich., on May 19.

The automaker said the reveal will be broadcast live across Ford's social media channels and will be shown in New York's Times Square and on the Las Vegas Boulevard. In all, the company says there will be more than 30 ways to watch either physically or digitally.

"Every so often, a new vehicle comes along that disrupts the status quo and changes the game ... Model T, Mustang, Prius, Model 3. Now comes the F-150 Lightning," Ford CEO Jim Farley said in a statement. "America's favorite vehicle for nearly half a century is going digital and fully electric. F-150 Lightning can power your home during an outage; it's even quicker than the original F-150 Lightning performance truck; and it will constantly improve through over-the-air updates."

Ford previously used th…

<!--*/ */ /*-->*/ They're baaaaack! Reports of the demise of auto shows were ... well ... way wrong

We're so vain.

We in the media probably thought auto shows were about us.

And who would blame us? For decades, automaker execs crashed through convention center windows, rappelled from hall ceilings and herded cattle on nearby streets, all in a bid to capture more "media buzz" than their rivals.

And when they decided that spending a million dollars or more for a 20-minute time slot wasn't worth it anymore, we started in with our "wither auto show" headlines.

And sure, that may actually have applied to the biggest venues, mainly Detroit's North American International Auto Show. Pullouts by high-profile German automakers prompted Detroit into some soul searching that resulted in its move away from its traditional snowy January format.

But in the rest of the U.S., it's been a different matter. According to Foresight Research, …

WASHINGTON -- Ford Motor Co. is recalling nearly 617,00 Explorers in the United States at the request of regulators because retention pins could loosen and allow roof rail covers to detach from the vehicle.

The recall covers 2016 through 2019 model year vehicles. Dealers will install push-pins and replace any damaged rail clips and roof rail covers, as necessary.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in April had requested Ford conduct a safety recall after first inquiring about the issue in early 2020 following 11 reports of roof rail cover detachment.

Ford in November approved a onetime repair and extended coverage action for 10 years or 150,000 miles to address the issue.

Billionaire Elon Musk dropped a surprise early in his hotly anticipated turn as host of "Saturday Night Live," saying in his monologue that he "is the first person with Asperger's" to host the show, before clowning through skits for the first global livestream of the NBCUniversal comedy show.

Musk, the CEO of Tesla Inc. and one of the world's richest individuals, opened his monologue by telling an audience in more than 100 countries he is "the first person with Asperger's to host SNL. At least the first to admit it." The billionaire made light of his tendency to speak in a monotone, adding "I'm pretty good at running human in emulation mode."

Asperger's syndrome is a condition on the autism spectrum that is associated with difficulty in social interaction, and sometimes is referred to as high functioning autism.

Comedian and Saturday Night Live alumni Dan Aykroyd has spoken in interviews about being diagnosed with a mild form of Asperger's. He hosted Sa…

Anthony Foxx, former secretary of the U.S. Department of Transportation, discusses President Biden’s infrastructure proposal, the appeal of removing certain highways and ways to ensure all communities benefit from transportation’s future.

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DETROIT — The microchip shortage has taken a bigger toll on General Motors' production plans than on Ford Motor Co.'s. But financially, the two automakers have very different outlooks for the remainder of the crisis.

While Ford says it will earn relatively little profit for the rest of the year, GM believes it has found a path through the storm that will largely shelter its bottom line.

By shutting down production of lower-profit crossovers and sedans for months, GM has been able to funnel its limited chip supplies to its most lucrative plants. It has continued to churn out high-profit pickups and SUVs without interruption.

"The trucks are the profit center of the Detroit 3," said Sam Fiorani, vice president at AutoForecast Solutions. "Keeping them in production is a large part, if not all, of their profits. GM has the benefit of having lower-demand, lower-profit cars in their lineup to remove from production, where Ford had already gotten rid of all th…

Larry Van Tuyl, who six years ago sold his portfolio of 81 dealerships to Warren Buffett-led Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in the industry's largest buy-sell transaction, is once again a dealership owner.

Van Tuyl, 71, told Automotive News last week that he now owns four stores, including three dealerships in a Phoenix suburb. He closed on the purchase of a Honda store in Houston on May 3.

And Van Tuyl is on the hunt for more dealerships.

He expects to close on additional acquisitions this year, he said.

"I don't know if that'll be 10 deals or 50 deals," Van Tuyl said. "We'll just see what the opportunities are."

After the March 2015 sale of Van Tuyl Group of Phoenix, then the largest privately held dealership group in the U.S., to Berkshire Hathaway, Van Tuyl said he spent five years as chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Automotive.

He told Automotive News that he had agreed to stay on as chairman for…

Even though COVID-19 upended the auto industry last year, shut down production lines for weeks and forced executives to reevaluate the long-term viability of their businesses, some suppliers now think 2021 is even worse.

The list of challenges is long and getting longer, Julie Fream, CEO of the Original Equipment Suppliers Association, said last week during an Automotive News Congress Conversations webcast.

"I think suppliers are navigating more than they ever have," Fream said as part of an industry panel. "Surprisingly, 2021 has become a more challenging and difficult year for suppliers than even 2020 was.

"At that point, the industry went down and then we came back up," she added. "But it is such a challenge to navigate all of these individual areas that are causing concerns and problems for suppliers."

All of the stumbling is making the industry painfully aware of its lack of visibility into its supply chain, added Mary Buchzeiger, CEO of me…

DETROIT — Lori Naylor is still confused three years later.

She had just graduated from temporary status to full time at a Fiat Chrysler Automobiles axle plant in Michigan when she learned that her employee number had been used to get someone a family discount on a new vehicle without her permission.

She found out by checking an online portal for workers that showed her number was used on a deal at Parkway Chrysler-Dodge-Jeep-Ram in Clinton Township, Mich. To this day, she doesn't know how.

"It feels like you're violated, like someone got into your personal stuff," Naylor, whose father was an auto dealer in Kentucky, told Automotive News. "It feels very corrupt."

Naylor called the store and FCA to alert them of her discovery. She doesn't know which salesperson had her information, but it turned out she wasn't the only one to complain about someone at Parkway misusing employee discounts.

Federal prosecutors …

Customers browsing inventory aren't met with a traditional lead form on Rydell Auto Center of Grand Forks' website.

Instead, beneath a payment calculator is a black button with the words: "Ask an expert." Click on it, and a chat window pops up, prompting customers to choose the dealership department they're looking for and telling them that the usual response time is a few minutes.

A live employee responds on average in less than a minute, said Morgan Hibma, marketing director of the three-store group in North Dakota. A lead form is still there, tucked away on a contact page. But Hibma said it's being phased out, and shoppers won't find it when checking out the detail page for a new Chevrolet Blazer.

Rydell is experimenting with replacing the lead form — which asks customers for contact information to view a price, for instance, or to get more information about a vehicle — with real-time communication through chat and text.

The dealership group …