Trade News

For four years the relationship between General Motors and the Canadian union Unifor was in tatters — marked by a strike, blockades, an international media campaign and the end of vehicle production at Oshawa Assembly.

Things have changed.

Since November, across back-to-back rounds of bargaining, GM and Unifor have agreed to new contracts that include up to CA$2.3 billion ($1.8 billion) in new investments in the automaker's Canadian assembly plants. By this time next year, Oshawa is expected to be building trucks again, and GM's CAMI Assembly plant in Ingersoll, Ontario, will build electric cargo vans for the company's new BrightDrop fleet business, unveiled this month during CES.

"We're at a point in our collective history where there are opportunities, and I'm not going to allow the past to get in the way of them," Unifor President Jerry Dias said.

GM and the union quietly began negotiating a new contract for CAMI early this month , long befor…

TOKYO — Toyota is putting a small electric vehicle on the roads of Japan with an innovative design for handling the country's narrow, winding streets and urban commuting needs.

The C+Pod, launched Dec. 25, measures just 8 feet, 2 inches long and 4 feet, 3 inches wide, delivering an ultratight turning radius of 12 feet, 10 inches.

The diminutive dimensions enable ideal navigation of the sharp corners and narrow streets that vein the home country's road network. The C+Pod is even narrower and shorter than the popular super-compact minicars that make up 37 percent of the local market.

The C+Pod — pronounced C Pod, without the plus — also represents a comeback for Toyota. It is the automaker's first electric car for Japan since it discontinued the short-lived eQ, a battery-driven version of the Scion iQ three-seat minicar.

The new entry is part of Toyota's gambit to get back into the EV game with a lineup of 10 EVs worldwide in the early 2020s. Today…

Firefighters thought they had extinguished the post-crash blaze. Then they heard popping sounds.

On the scene of a fatal crash involving a Tesla Model X in Mountain View, Calif., in March 2018, the fire department contemplated the energy hazards that lay in the wrecked electric vehicle before them. When further complications and potential dangers surfaced, the fire department called for help from the vehicle manufacturer.

In this case, it was fortuitous that Tesla's headquarters was just across San Francisco Bay. In a matter of hours, two Tesla engineers had arrived at the crash site. But not every electric vehicle crash occurs in close proximity to industry-leading engineers.

As EVs proliferate, safety advocates and crash investigators are increasingly concerned about the risks lithium ion batteries pose to emergency responders.

In a report issued this month, the National Transportation Safety Board found vehicle manufacturers have given firefi…

DETROIT — Ally Financial Inc. reported Friday an 82 percent jump in fourth-quarter net income driven by fewer reserves for credit losses and $1 billion growth in auto originations.

Ally, one of the largest U.S. auto lenders, reported net income of $687 million. Fourth-quarter adjusted earnings per share of $1.60 were the highest in company history, and revenue rose 21 percent year over year to $1.98 billion.

Ally's earnings before taxes were impacted by a $34 million cost relating to establishing its charitable foundation and a $78 million cost it set aside for a pending legal settlement. The case, Ally Financial v. Alberta Haskins, et al., began as a dispute over a vehicle repossession and is pending in a Missouri court.

Ally's fourth-quarter results displayed strong resilience to the economic toll of the coronavirus pandemic, which has killed over 400,000 Americans and skyrocketed unemployment.

This past year presented one of the most complex le…

Hank Aaron, the famed home run king who later became a major Georgia auto dealer, died Friday at age 86.

Aaron's baseball career spanned 23 seasons, capped by "the most famous home run in baseball history," according to MLB.com.

That 715th home run, in 1974, put the longtime Atlanta Braves outfielder in front of Babe Ruth on the all-time home run list.

"What a marvelous moment for baseball, what a marvelous moment for Atlanta and the state of Georgia, what a marvelous moment for the country and the world," announcers said at the time.

Breaking the record came along with hate and scrutiny, but Aaron held onto it, with 755 home runs, for 33 years.

David Ortiz, the longtime Boston Red Sox slugger, described Aaron in a tweet: "A legend on and off the ball field."

Off the field, Aaron took on the role of entrepreneur when he opened 17 fast-food franchises and started Hank Aaron Automotive Group.

The Atlanta-based auto group consi…

DETROIT — Production at Ford Motor Co.'s Louisville Assembly Plant will be stopped for the second time this month, beginning next week, as a microchip shortage continues to upend the auto industry.

The Kentucky plant, which employs roughly 3,900 workers building the Ford Escape and Lincoln Corsair crossovers, will be down the next two weeks, according to Ford spokeswoman Kelli Felker. Louisville Assembly was previously down the week of Jan. 11 for the same reason.

Hourly workers will receive 75 percent of their gross pay during the downtime. The latest production suspension was first reported by the (Louisville) Courier Journal.

The issue has also shuttered Ford's plant in Saarlouis, Germany, and is affecting a number of automakers around the globe. IHS Markit forecasts that chip-related supply wrinkles will linger into the second quarter and possibly even the second half of this year.

Join Automotive News Publisher Jason Stein for a daily podcast series about the coronavirus crisis. He’ll speak with industry experts, insiders and Automotive News reporters about how the virus is impacting and reshaping the automotive industry.

A number of automotive CEOs have committed to move the needle on diversity, equity and inclusion. Lisa Lunsford, CEO of GS3 Global, and Glenn Stevens, executive director of MICHauto, discuss the launch of the CEO Coalition for Change and explain how the initiative is aiming to create more opportunities for women and minorities in the auto industry.

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CarLotz began trading shares Friday on the Nasdaq exchange under the "LOTZ" ticker symbol, becoming the latest online used-vehicle company to go public.

CarLotz, which focuses on used-vehicle consignment, announced last year it would become a publicly traded company by completing a reverse merger with Acamar Partners Acquisition Corp., a special-purpose acquisition company. It's the same method Shift Technologies used to go public last October.

Shares in the company closed Friday's trading down 3.1 percent to $11.92..

CarLotz CEO Michael Bor told Automotive News last week that going public should help raise the company's profile and visibility.

"I think it's going to do great things for our ability to source vehicles," he said. "I'm also really excited about dramatically enhancing the brand awareness that we have."

Bor added that the company had historically been "overly efficient" with its marketing spend. "Still today, even in markets whe…

EVgo Services LLC, a charging network for electric vehicles that’s entirely powered by renewable energy, is nearing a deal to go public through a merger with Climate Change Crisis Real Impact I Acquisition Corp., according to people with knowledge of the matter.

A transaction is set to value the combined entity at more than $2 billion, said one of the people, who asked not to be identified as the information is private. An announcement could come as soon as Friday, the people said.

Shares of Climate Change Crisis, which is a special-purpose acquisition company, jumped as much as 117 percent in pre-market trading Friday.

As with any deal that isn’t yet finalized, it could still be delayed or talks could collapse. A representative for EVgo didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment, and a spokesman for the Climate Change Crisis SPAC declined to comment.

EVgo, founded in 2010, has more than 800 fast-charging locations in more than 600 cities…

Volkswagen Group's 2020 adjusted operating profit nearly halved but the automaker said its vehicle deliveries continued to recover strongly in the fourth quarter.

Operating profit before special items related to the diesel-emissions scandal was about 10 billion euros ($12.2 billion), VW said in a statement on Friday.

The automaker, whose brands include Porsche, Audi and Bentley, had reported an operating profit of 19.3 billion euros in 2019.

Automotive net cash flow was about 6 billion euros ($7.3 billion) in 2020, VW said.

A robust sales recovery in the second half helped earnings despite fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic, the company said.

"The deliveries to customers of the Volkswagen Group continued to recover strongly in the fourth quarter and even exceeded the deliveries of the third quarter 2020," VW said in the statement.

VW will report detailed full-year earnings and provide guidance for 2021 at the end of next month.

TURIN – Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares will have 38 top executives reporting directly to him at the new automotive group – more than twice as many than at PSA Group, and considerably more than the last two CEOs at Fiat Chrysler.

The organization structure released this week gives Tavares direct control over all functions, regions and brands at Stellantis, and he will also sit on or chair nine operating committees.

That number of direct reports is one of the highest in the automotive industry. When Sergio Marchionne merged Chrysler into Fiat to create FCA, he had a total of 28 direct reports. Marchionne’s successor at the helm of FCA, Mike Manley, had 22 functions reporting directly to him. At PSA, Tavares had 18 direct reports.

A Stellantis spokesman said that the nine governance committees were selected in lieu of a traditional executive committee in an effort to be more focused and time effective.

The spokesman said that the committees would be …

Vehicle listings company CarGurus promoted CFO Jason Trevisan to CEO as founder and former CEO Langley Steinert steps back from the top role to focus on product and strategy.

Steinert, 57, will become CarGurus' executive chairman, the Cambridge, Mass., company said Thursday, but will no longer lead its day-to-day operations.

Scot Fredo, 52, will take over as CFO, CarGurus said. Fredo joined the company in 2016 and most recently was the company's senior vice president of financial planning and analysis.

All three changes were effective Jan. 18, CarGurus said Thursday in a federal regulatory filing.

Steinert wrote in a letter to shareholders released Thursday that he had been transitioning oversight of CarGurus' operations during the past year to Trevisan and Sam Zales, president and COO, so he could spend more time on innovation and strategy.

"As Executive Chairman and the company's controlling shareholder, I will remain involved in the…