Trade News

The streets of Miami and South Beach are filled with luxury and exotic vehicles. But few are Alfa Romeos. 

Breaking into the chic market has been an uphill slog for dealers since the Italian brand's U.S. return in 2014, and a group of Alfa Romeo dealers in the area have been working for more than a year on a Tier 2 advertising strategy to build awareness.

Their efforts contributed to a double-digit gain in Alfa's U.S. third-quarter sales and have created a blueprint that soon could be adopted by other stores in critical markets around the country.

The dealers' collaboration on a campaign that has received matching dollars from Fiat Chrysler Automobiles has "gotten a lot of attention from the other markets," Scott Ritter, part owner of Planet Alfa Romeo in Miami, told Automotive News. "There's been other dealers that have looked and seen the growth down in our area in Miami and have asked people they know at the brand what's going on. I think that …

Automakers and tech companies have sought to cultivate the trust of consumers as they've developed and launched driver-assist systems that many consider a prelude to self-driving vehicles. Those efforts may be misguided.

Consumers often are confused by the performance capabilities and limitations of driver-assist systems, which can control some steering, acceleration and braking tasks. Motorists who place too much trust in these features may find themselves in potentially dangerous or deadly situations.

Instead of seeking trust, automakers should emphasize the collaborative nature of driver-assist features, says Matthew Young, director of research at Thatcham Research, an automotive safety agency based in the United Kingdom that develops repair methods and conducts crash tests.

"Automakers will ask me, 'Are you asking us to make these systems so the driver doesn't trust it?' and to some degree the answer is yes," he tells Automotive News. "You don't wan…

Used-vehicle values are cooling off, but prices as of mid-October still hovered nearly 10 percent above year-end 2019 levels.

For the week ended Oct. 17, wholesale vehicle prices at Manheim auctions were 9.7 percent higher than at the start of the year, and retail prices were 9 percent higher, according to Cox Automotive. But prices slipped for that week compared with the week before — down 0.6 percent for 2017 models at Manheim and down 0.2 percent at retail.

"Weekly price data continued to show used-vehicle prices falling," Cox Automotive Chief Economist Jonathan Smoke said last week.

The year took an abrupt turn from normalcy in March as the coronavirus spread rapidly in the U.S. and state and local governments issued stay-at-home orders. Many businesses had to close, even if temporarily, and automakers stopped vehicle production.

Vehicle auctions went all-digital or halted sales altogether. By the second week of Apr…

Daimler is slowly pulling back the curtain on how its line of Mercedes-Benz sports cars will evolve as the leading luxury-vehicle maker goes electric.

CEO Ola Kallenius has dropped hints this month that Mercedes plans to challenge brands including crosstown rival Porsche by introducing plug-in performance models. He told German monthly Manager Magazin in an interview published Thursday that it’s very likely Mercedes will introduce a battery-electric platform for sports cars in the coming years.

“We have a very comprehensive product portfolio, including very attractive sports cars, and sports cars will go electric as well,” Harald Wilhelm, Daimler’s CFO, said Friday on Bloomberg Television. “So stay tuned.”

Tesla Inc. has popularized EVs in no small part by proving they’re capable of measuring up to or even outperforming sports cars. Porsche started selling its debut electric model, the Taycan, late last year.

Mercedes must electrify its sports car…

Motional and Lyft said their self-driving ride-share service in Las Vegas is resuming after the coronavirus pandemic paused operations earlier this year.

Motional, the joint venture between Hyundai Motor America and Aptiv, was rebranded in August and is relaunching in alignment with COVID-19 guidelines.

According to a statement from Motional on Thursday, 70 percent of Americans said the coronavirus is impacting their transportation decisions.

"Our vehicles now include a clear partition between the front and rear seats," Gretchen Effgen, vice president of marketing at Motional, told Automotive News. "At the start of each shift, all high-touch areas in the vehicle are sanitized."

Motional also supplies hand sanitizer, gloves and wipes inside the vehicle and asks riders to wear masks during their ride.

"Government partners in Las Vegas and Nevada have been instrumental in supporting the partnership and making self-driving ride-hails a reality …

Scott Painter, the founder and former CEO of online car leasing startup Fair, is exploring a bid to acquire the company from SoftBank Group Corp.'s Vision Fund and other investors, people familiar with the matter said on Friday.

The effort comes as Fair, which leases vehicles by working with car dealerships, is recovering from a setback in its attempt to expand in ride-sharing. It ended a program that provided weekly rentals for Uber Technologies Inc drivers earlier this year, citing an unexpected increase in insurance premiums.

Painter, who stepped down from Fair last year, is in talks with special-purpose acquisition companies, including Cantor Fitzgerald LP's CF Finance Acquisition Corp II, about making an offer for the startup, the people said.

The sources cautioned that a deal with a SPAC was not guaranteed and was one of several options considered by Fair. They asked not to be identified because the matter is confidential.

SoftBank declined …

Sales and profits rebounded for Gentex Corp. in the third quarter because of cost-saving actions, new launches and some quick decision-making.

Gentex released its performance results Friday in what could be a positive bellwether for global suppliers.

The Zeeland, Mich., supplier of dimmable rearview mirrors and other electronic components posted net income of $117.1 million for the third quarter, a 5 percent increase from the same period a year earlier. Gentex posted its second-highest sales quarter in company history, with net sales of $474.6 million.

CEO Steve Downing said customer orders came back so quickly that it caught the company by surprise.

"In fact," Downing said in a statement releasing the financial data, "during the third quarter, volumes increased so quickly that it became very difficult for our operations team to keep up, but in typical Gentex fashion, the team pulled together, with many salaried employees volunteering to help…

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.

Deborah Wince-Smith, CEO of the U.S. Council on Competitiveness, examines the state of manufacturing in the U.S. and explains how the pandemic is exposing security vulnerabilities in the supply chain.

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Automakers are investing billions of dollars to bring new electric vehicles to consumers in the U.S. and other global markets, but their success hinges on securing the most critical and expensive component: the battery.

A handful of companies based in China, Japan and South Korea make automotive-grade battery cells, which has upset the traditional dynamic between automakers and suppliers. These battery giants -- though little known to the general public and relatively new to the auto industry’s sprawling supply chain -- are key to manufacturers’ goals of bringing dozens of new EV models to U.S. showrooms by 2025.

“There are not enough batteries to fulfill the automakers’ near-term promises,” said Sam Jaffe, managing director of Cairn ERA, an energy-storage consulting firm in Boulder, Colo. “A lot of new battery factories are being built. But there is a battery-supply problem in the near term. All of the incumbent automakers are scrambling at this point.”

STOCKHOLM -- Sweden's Autoliv, the world's largest producer of airbags and seatbelts, reported higher than expected quarterly earnings on Friday as it returned to profit in the wake of a plunge in car production due to the pandemic.

Autoliv reported a third-quarter operating profit of $175 million compared with a $154 million profit in the year-ago quarter and a mean forecast of $163 million based on a poll of analysts published by the company.

On an adjusted basis, operating earnings were $206 million in the quarter, up from a year-ago $183 million.

The rival of ZF and Joyson Safety Systems also said that for the full year it expected to further outperform global light vehicle production during a "very busy" fourth quarter for order intake.

"The worst demand decline on record in the second quarter was followed by a faster than expected recovery in the third quarter, with its challenges of managing the supply chain," CEO Mikael Bratt said in the …