Trade News – Page 781

EV maker Fisker to go public via merger; company valued at $2.9B

Electric vehicle maker Fisker Inc. plans to go public through a merger with a special purpose company backed by private equity firm Apollo Global Management Inc. at a $2.9 billion valuation, the companies said on Monday.

Reuters reported last week that the special purpose acquisition company, Spartan Energy Acquisition Corp., was leading a bidding war among special purpose companies for Fisker.

The proceeds are expected to be used to bring the company's first product, the Fisker Ocean, to production in late 2022.

Spartan's shares rose 19.4 percent in premarket trading.

The deal will provide Fisker with $1 billion in gross proceeds, including $500 million of funds from existing and new investors such as AllianceBernstein and BlackRock Inc.

Henrik Fisker, a one-time Aston-Martin designer, launched the eponymous Los Angeles-based company in 2016, and plans to begin selling the Fisker Ocean luxury electric SUV at a starting price of $37,500. Read more

Daimler's labor talks heat up, with 15,000 jobs at risk

FRANKFURT -- Labor representatives at Daimler said Monday that discussions with management over cost cuts had become "rougher" after a board member said over the weekend that more than 15,000 jobs were at risk.

The auto industry has been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, which shut factories and showrooms forcing traditional automakers to seek deeper cuts.

Daimler had already said in November, before the pandemic started, that it would cut at least 10,000 jobs worldwide over the following three years, following peers as they cut costs to invest in electric vehicles while grappling with weakening sales.

The owner of the Mercedes-Benz brand had stuck with a pledge at the time to avoid forced redundancies at its German workforce until 2029.

Daimler board member Wilfried Porth told the Stuttgarter Zeitung over the weekend that more than 15,000 workers would now have to take a buyout or retire to avoid forced layoffs.

The works council for D…

Trailblazer, with low price point, aims to lift brand

DETROIT — By killing the Chevrolet Cruze last year and now the Sonic in a few months, General Motors is leaving itself with just two vehicles that start at less than $20,000.

That includes the new Trailblazer, which aims to put Chevy on more consumers' radars by landing in one of the industry's fastest-growing segments: small crossovers.

The Trailblazer complements the Trax, which posted a 30 percent U.S. sales gain last year but is too small for some buyers, by giving Chevy a roomier option with a more mature look. And unlike the Trax, it was designed from the ground up with U.S. consumers top of mind.

"We're thinking the Trailblazers are going to catch on in a big way," said Paul Waatti, industry analyst at AutoPacific.

In the second quarter, Chevy sold 6,699 Trailblazers, which just started reaching dealerships in March. It's already more popular than GM's other sub-$20,000 entry, the Spark, which logged 5,311 sales i…

Sometimes more urgent plans take precedence

In early March, the team at Outsell held an off-site, multiday meeting to create the dealership marketing company's long-term product development road map.

There were plans for a new content management system, more product integrations and new reporting tools.

But within weeks, the situation changed. The pandemic prompted states across most of the country to order retailers to shutter showrooms, with sales and service business being slashed.

"We took that road map we had just spent weeks trying to finalize and set it completely aside," Gary Marcotte, Outsell's senior vice president of customer engagement innovation, told me.

Outsell, which automates dealership marketing messages aimed at consumers across their life cycles, shifted gears to focus instead on products that retailers would need to get through the virus-induced economic crisis. They included a new equity-mining tool to help dealers identify people in the market who might want to trade …

Harvey aims to build on Cadillac's momentum

DETROIT — Rory Harvey, Cadillac's next global boss, will continue the plan he plotted out with departing chief Steve Carlisle, but at higher speed.

Harvey, vice president of Cadillac North America sales, service and marketing, has been Carlisle's right-hand man for the past two years. They took their posts at Cadillac within a month of each other in early 2018.

"Now is the opportunity to accelerate," Harvey told Automotive News.

Cadillac boasts the luxury segment's newest lineup as it launches a new vehicle about every six months for three years, starting in 2019. It debuted a redesigned version of the iconic Escalade SUV in February, and the brand will lead General Motors' charge into electric vehicles and the expansion of Super Cruise, GM's driver-assist technology.

Cadillac dealer profitability, customer satisfaction, vehicle quality and sales effectiveness also have improved over the past two years, Harvey said. Read more

Subscriptions haven't paid off but worth the try

The early results from the Great Auto Subscription Experiment are in, and ... they've been canceled.

As reported recently in Automotive News, Mercedes-Benz USA, like Cadillac before it, will wind down its subscription program this summer after testing it in a few cities for a couple of years. Demand, according to sales chief Adam Chamberlain, was "just OK" — which doesn't scream "moneymaker!"

A lot of smart people at automakers, retailers and vendors such as Clutch Technologies have put considerable time and thought into the subscription model. It offers consumers an alternative to traditional ownership or leasing by bundling in the costs of maintenance and insurance, and some allow clients to swap vehicles to match their needs or moods.

To be sure, a handful of consumers have found a vehicle subscription appealing. Porsche plans to expand its U.S. program to cities beyond Atlanta. But other brands aren't seeing the scale or pricing to operate efficientl…

Rail porter allegedly stole nearly 2,000 key fobs

A Michigan man is accused of stealing nearly 2,000 key fobs from new vehicles that passed through a CSX rail yard where he worked.

Jason Gibbs, 41, was charged last week after a two-year investigation into why so many vehicles made by General Motors, Ford Motor Co. and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles had been arriving at their destination with one of their two key fobs missing. All of the vehicles missing fobs had been shipped from the CSX yard in New Boston, Mich., near Detroit Metropolitan Airport.

Investigators cracked the case after finding some of the missing fobs for sale on eBay. They bought three Ford F-150 fobs and traced the payment for postage to Gibbs' debit card, according to an affidavit from a U.S. postal inspector.

The return address was an abandoned home in Detroit where Gibbs had grown up.

Gibbs worked for a CSX contractor as a utility porter, a job that involved preparing vehicles to be loaded onto rail cars and fixing problems with…

USMCA: Toolbox, not obstacle course

TO THE EDITOR:

Almost all the commentary I have read from trade experts on USMCA's rules abruptly conclude with, "They're complicated." That's a cop-out; anyone glancing at the text sees that. Stopping there, the private-sector trade community, particularly the auto industry, is left high and dry without desperately needed practical guidance on what it must do to ensure business complies with the rules and, more importantly, captures all the duty-free benefits of the "new NAFTA." If more of my colleagues were to step up and plunge into the jumble drawer of Notwithstanding, Footnote 75, Annex B and Table A-2 as I have, the trade community would have some tangible advice. USMCA is much more a tool kit of extremely useful rules than it is a compliance obstacle course. By properly understanding and applying USMCA's rules — the province of trade experts — the trade community will understand, appreciate and maybe even celebrate it as the rule set to facilitate and nurture N…

Rethinking parking after COVID-19

Traditional parking spaces and lots were already the subject of attention pre-pandemic. The seemingly one-dimensional blocks of real estate are the source of fierce frustration when unavailable — or utter joy when a spot magically appears and life seems to effortlessly fall into place.

Parking is a universal issue: To some degree, we've all experienced adding in travel time to circle blocks to find a space; managing our tempers when construction takes over a parking zone; running down the block to beat a parking enforcement officer to avoid a fine; breathing in excessive exhaust from idling cars waiting for a spot; and wondering why the parking-to-population ratio just never seems realistic.

For a while, it seemed like the ride-hailing and public transport lifestyle was a quasi-solution and a step in the right direction. These modes for getting from Point A to Point B supported emotions and logistics in not having to deal with finding a parki…

Tesla slashes Model Y price by $3,000 as pandemic upends market

Tesla Inc. has cut the price of its Model Y crossover by $3,000 less than four months after starting sales.

The starting price is now $51,190, including a $1,200 destination and documentation fee, according to Tesla’s website. The electric-car maker had been charging $54,190 since beginning deliveries in mid-March.

The Model Y reduction is the second significant price cut Tesla has made to its vehicles in roughly six weeks. In late May, the company lopped $5,000 off the Model S and X and $2,000 off the Model 3, which some analysts viewed as a bearish signal of demand.

Tesla ended up delivering 90,650 cars to customers in the second quarter, beating analysts’ estimates and sending its shares soaring. The 269 percent surge in the stock price this year has vaulted CEO Elon Musk past Warren Buffett on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The company started deliveries of the Model Y in Ma…

Tesla slashes Model Y price as pandemic upends market

Tesla Inc. cut the price of the Model Y crossover by $3,000, just four months after its launch, as the electric carmaker seeks to maintain sales momentum during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The reduction follows price cuts in May on the Model 3, Model X and Model S.

The company this month posted a smaller-than-expected decline in new-vehicle deliveries in the second quarter, resilient results despite the pandemic that hit the global auto industry.

The Model Y now starts at $49,990, down nearly 6 percent from a previous price of $52,990, according to the carmaker's website.

Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The company started deliveries of the Model Y in March, promising a much-awaited crossover that will face competition from European carmakers as Volkswagen Group and others roll out their own electric rivals.

In April, Tesla had said the Model Y was already profitable, marking the first time in the company's 17-…

First half scoreboard for 2020 U.S. sales

U.S. auto sales rebounded in May and June, but not enough to overcome abysmal results in March and April. Here’s how the first 6 months of 2020 compare with last year.