Trade News

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 …

Carvana has been dogged by production woes since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic but showed signs of improvement in that area — turning around vehicles for sale — in the first quarter as it reported higher revenue and a narrower net loss.

Production for the online used-vehicle retailer means getting used cars and trucks sale-ready: receiving, inspecting and reconditioning them.

Carvana added staff to its reconditioning facilities during the first quarter and improved weekly average vehicle production by 26 percent compared with the fourth quarter of 2020. The improvement has continued — Carvana's weekly production rate was 51 percent higher in April and early May than in last year's fourth quarter.

But the retailer's average available inventory for sale was down 27 percent in the first quarter compared with the fourth quarter.

Carvana has struggled with low inventory — and keeping pace with consumer demand — for …

Volkswagen Group's ambitions in highly automated and autonomous vehicles have been cooled by setbacks.

Those included premium subsidiary Audi abandoning plans to turn on Level 3 conditional autonomy in the A8 flagship sedan and the group's inability to create a standard for the technology together with partners.

In addition, rivals such as Tesla, Honda, Mercedes-Benz and BMW are pressing ahead with much greater speed than Europe's largest automaker.

Honda said in March that in Japan, it will sell a limited batch of its flagship Legend sedan equipped with Sensing Elite Level 3 autonomous driving technology that enables vehicles to navigate congested highways.

When Traffic Jam Pilot is activated in the system, a driver can watch movies or use the navigation on the screen, helping to mitigate fatigue and stress when driving in heavy traffic, Honda said in a statement.

Mercedes hopes to follow Honda sometime in t…

TrueCar Inc. reported a smaller first-quarter loss Thursday amid steep revenue declines and lagging dealership participation.

The vehicle-listings provider narrowed its first-quarter net loss to $8.4 million from $10.7 million in the year-earlier period. Revenue slid 18 percent to $65.1 million, largely because of the loss of USAA Federal Savings Bank vehicle volumes from the termination of the relationship last September.

TrueCar CEO Mike Darrow said Thursday on a call with investors that the company's dealer churn was better than expected despite inventory issues caused by the industry's chip shortages.

"The reduced new-car inventory levels, paired with strong natural consumer demand, has retailers closely monitoring demand-generating sales and marketing expenses, which we believe will put pressure on our dealer count," Darrow said. "We share the widely held view that the chip and inventory shortages will be temporary."

TrueCar's franc…

The former CEO of Van Tuyl Group, who in 2015 sold his dealership empire to Berkshire Hathaway Inc., has purchased a Honda store in Texas.

Larry Van Tuyl on Monday bought Team Gillman Honda West in Houston from Chris Gillman, said Bill Scrivner, CEO of Pinnacle Mergers & Acquisitions in Frisco, Texas.

Scrivner told Automotive News that he represented Van Tuyl in the transaction. Gillman had purchased the store in December from Penske Automotive Group Inc., Scrivner said.

Terms of the Van Tuyl-Gillman transaction weren't disclosed. The store has been renamed Easy Honda.

In October 2014, Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway announced that it had agreed to acquire Van Tuyl Group, the largest privately held dealership group in the country. It was the fourth-largest U.S. dealership group as ranked by Automotive News based on retail sales of 139,538 new vehicles in 2014.

The deal closed in March 2015, as Berkshire acquired 81 dealerships and…

DETROIT -- Stellantis wants white-collar employees to think of the workplace as a tool, not merely as an office where they work.

This mindset underscores the automaker's global effort to reimagine its workplace strategy, dubbed the "New Era of Agility," that it will adopt as the world moves past the pandemic.

The automaker, renamed Stellantis after the merger of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles with PSA Group, envisions a hybrid working model that will see employees spend 70 percent of their time working remotely while 30 percent is spent on-site.

Stellantis plans to begin a pilot project in October at the Chrysler Technical Center in Auburn Hills, Mich., to test the approach. The project is expected to last four to six weeks.

Shannon Dziuda, human resources special projects lead for Stellantis North America, said the company sees its team "using the workplace to connect and collaborate with colleagues and participate in workshops and project manage…

Longtime drivetrain supplier American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings Inc. on Friday reported across-the-board gains in the first quarter.

American Axle, of Detroit, joined several suppliers in reporting first-quarter financial results impacted by the global semiconductor chip shortage that is plaguing the industry.

American Axle's first-quarter net income was $38.6 million, up considerably from a net loss of $501.3 million in the year-earlier period.

The company said revenue improved 6.1 percent to $1.43 billion in the quarter. American Axle said sales took a $64 million hit because of the chip shortage.

Adjusted earnings before interest expense, income taxes, depreciation and amortization stood at $262.9 million, a growth of 23 percent from the year-earlier period.

The company also reported more net cash in the first quarter — $179.1 million compared to $139.4 million in the first quarter of 2020. Adjusted free cash flow was $174.1 mil…

LMP Automotive Holdings Inc. has closed on its latest acquisition: a majority stake in a Subaru dealership.

LMP, which started as a used-car seller and vehicle subscription provider and acquired its first franchised dealerships this year, on Wednesday purchased an 85 percent stake in Hometown Subaru in Mount Hope, W.Va. The dealership is about 50 miles south of the West Virginia state capital of Charleston and marks the first Subaru store for LMP, which went public in December 2019.

Terms were not disclosed, but LMP is keeping the store's name.

LMP acquired the stake in the Subaru dealership from Ernie Davis and Lori Davis. In March, LMP acquired 85 percent stakes in Beckley Buick-GMC Automall and King Coal Chevrolet in Oak Hill, both in West Virginia, also from the Davises, and an 85 percent stake in Hometown Kia, which is located next to the Subaru store.

"We are extremely excited to represent Subaru," LMP COO Richard Aldahan said in an email.<…

Nikola Corp. said in a filing Friday that securities regulators investigating the company issued an additional subpoena in March. 

The aspiring truckmaker said the new subpoena issued by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on March 24 relates to its projected 2021 cash flow and how it plans to use funds from capital raises this year. The company, which had previously disclosed investigations by the SEC and the Department of Justice, said it’s committed to complying with all investigations.

The company also disclosed that it paid $3 million in legal fees in the first quarter for Trevor Milton, its founder and former executive chairman, who resigned in September. The payments were made under the terms of an indemnification agreement.

Quarterly earningsThe Phoenix-based company also on Friday reported a net loss of $120 million for the first three months of the year, widening from a $33 million loss a year earlier. Adjusted earnings before inte…

Editor's note: This story has been updated to more accurately reflect the size of Rocket Co.'s housing business and its relationships with vehicle retailers.

Detroit's Rocket Cos., parent company of mortgage lending giant Quicken Loans, has partnered with AutoFi, a digital car sales and finance platform, to add finance offerings to its planned consumer-facing automotive retail marketplace.

The future site, Rocket Auto, will feature vehicle inventory and connect customers directly to auto lender offerings. Rocket Cos. would not say when the e-commerce site will launch. Rocket Auto currently serves as a white label call center for online used-car retailer Vroom and other vehicle retailers.

"Rocket Companies is one of the most innovative and successful names in technology and financial services," said Kevin Singerman, CEO of AutoFi, in a statement. "AutoFi is incredibly excited to partner with a leader in the industry on their journey in growing Rocket Aut…

Stellantis has lengthened the shutdowns of its Jeep Cherokee and Chrysler minivan plants into mid-May because of the global semiconductor shortage.

The Cherokee plant in Belvidere, Ill., will remain down through the middle of the month, Stellantis said in a statement issued Thursday. The Windsor Assembly Plant in Ontario, which makes the Chrysler Pacifica and Voyager, will be down through the second week of May, the statement said.

Meanwhile, production of the Jeep Compass in Toluca, Mexico, has resumed.

"Stellantis continues to work closely with our suppliers to mitigate the manufacturing impacts caused by the various supply chain issues facing our industry," spokeswoman Jodi Tinson said in the statement.

In addition to the Cherokee and minivan plants, the Ram 1500 Classic plant in Warren, Mich., remains offline. The plant is preparing to begin building the Jeep Wagoneer and Grand Wagoneer SUVs in June.

Production resumed April 19 at the c…