News

Here are highlights from the latest episodes of 'Daily Drive', Automotive News' weekday podcast, Oct. 17-20, hosted by Jamie Butters with Kellen Walker.

"On an average, we probably receive about 100, 125 now, leads that I can say are from social media."--Eric Barbosa, managing partner of Henson Brand Dealerships in Texas, on the benefits dealers are seeing from new retail technology and digital strategies

"I believe you need three pieces of technology to get [intelligent speed assistance] right. You need a map. You need an electronic horizon that reads the data from the map that is ahead of the vehicle. And then you need a camera that can also look out for speed limit signs."--Philip Hubertus, HERE Technologies' director of product management, on intelligent speed assistance, which is now mandatory for all new vehicles sold in the European Union

"I have great confidence that, indeed, this environment is going to put a solid floor under vehicle values. An…

I'm a compliance lawyer for car dealers. It ain't sexy, but as they say, it pays the bills.

And speaking of paying the bills, the Federal Trade Commission recently proposed a massive new set of regulations for car dealers. Every time the agency does this, lawyers like me make money, and lots of it. Dealers have to shell out big bucks to lawyers and compliance companies whenever the FTC makes new rules, largely because these rules are basically indecipherable to anyone other than lawyers who specialize in this area.

I have spent a lot of time analyzing and distilling complicated regulations, providing regulatory compliance advice to dealers for nearly 30 years. So I think I am qualified to say that the only ones who will benefit from these new regulations are lawyers like me and some dishonest dealers.

The FTC claims that adoption of these rules will direct business away from dishonest dealers and save consumers billions of dollars'…

Ouster Inc. has unveiled a series of digital lidar sensors that use a new chip and provide double the range of the previous generation.

The San Francisco company said its REV7 sensors have a maximum range of more than 400 yards, allowing detection of objects up to a quarter-mile away.

The distance is achieved by use of the company's new proprietary L3 chip that's capable of calculating approximately 10 trillion photons per second.

"We doubled the range of all our products just by swapping the chip," Ouster CEO Angus Pacala told Automotive News.

This puts the REV7 sensor on par with the lidar sensor of autonomous-vehicle developer Argo AI, which also has range of approximately 400 yards. But it's below the range of AEye's lidar that detected vehicles at more than a half-mile away in an independent test.

Backward compatibility

In addition to improved range, Ouster lidar sensors' backward compatibility makes them unique and competitive,…

The second generation of Kia's Niro EV, which tops off the automaker's trio of electrified compact crossovers that also includes plug-in hybrid and gasoline-electric hybrid powertrains, goes on sale this month in all 50 states.

The Korean automaker slashed $200 off the price for buyers that opt into the higher of two trims, called the Wave.

For 2023, Kia simplified the lineup from three trims to two. The more expensive Niro EV Wave will cost $45,745, including a $1,295 destination fee. By comparison, the first-generation Nio's top trim, the Niro EV EX Premium, was priced at $45,945.

The entry trim, called the Wind, is priced at $40,745. It sits between the previous generation's base Niro EV S ($40,385) and mid-level Niro EV EX ($41,285).

The lack of a price increase, given many automakers are hiking EV MSRP's, will help keep the Niro EV competitive against domestically built EVs that now qualify for the $7,500 federal tax credit. The Niro EV is …

Donnie Wetsel believes that aggressively selling tire and wheel services boosts profits and prevents customers from drifting away to independent shops, not only for new tires and alignments, but also for the oil changes and other maintenance and repair services that his technicians should be doing.

When Wetsel, 36, took over as service director at Onion Creek Volkswagen in Austin, Texas, in January, he made it a priority to straighten out the store's sales of alignments and replacement tires.

The dealership invested around $75,000 in three Hunter Quick Check machines that read alignment specs as the customer drives into the service lane.

The results are posted instantly on a screen the customer can see and on a printed color handout showing wheel alignment in a red-yellow-green format.

But the service advisers at Onion Creek Volkswagen were not putting a priority on explaining the results to their customers. So to fix that, Wetsel devised sales …

Honda will use its forthcoming CR-V Hybrid to hold onto EV-minded buyers until its Prologue electric crossover arrives at U.S. dealerships in 2024.

Shoppers for the hybrid compact crossover, which goes on sale this fall in two well-equipped trims, the Sport and Sport Touring, will be able to opt into a two-year lease that will let them easily swap into a Prologue electric vehicle when it reaches dealership lots.

While final details have not been worked out, "there will be some sort of benefit to purchasers of the Prologue from having taken the lease, whether it's a financial incentive or something else," said Gary Robinson, American Honda's assistant vice president of product planning.

Robinson said the CR-V serves as a steppingstone to other Honda crossovers. "About 60 percent of CR-V buyers are repeat Honda customers," he said. "They're buyers who continue to stay in the brand."

Honda predicts that half of all CR-V buy…

Tesla Inc. posted record sales numbers in the third quarter, but analysts are expressing doubts about the EV leader's ability to power through an economic slowdown — despite CEO Elon Musk's assurance that the company is "certainly recession-resilient."

As of market close Thursday, Oct. 20, the high-flying stock is down 48 percent so far this year, including a nearly 7 percent decline following Tesla's third-quarter earnings report last week. By comparison, the Nasdaq Composite Index is down 33 percent this year.

Tesla's third-quarter revenue and vehicle deliveries missed analysts' estimates. At least six brokerages lowered their price targets on the stock, according to Reuters, with Tesla bull Wedbush Securities making the biggest cut of $60, bringing its target to $300 a share.

Part of the doubt concerns Musk's sales target of growing by about 50 percent a year into the foreseeable future — along with his predictions that Tesla could become the most v…

PAHRUMP, Nev. — Countless data points gathered by vehicles every day on public roads can be used to improve safety and traffic flow and speed up emergency response times.

British automotive data startup Wejo hopes to play a major role in getting the auto industry to that point by using data to learn how drivers behave in every use-case scenario.

The goal is to predict what happens "within three meters on this road at this time of day in these specific road conditions," Wejo CEO Richard Barlow said during a demonstration of the company's technology near Las Vegas in late September.

The Manchester-based company has collected data on vehicle and road conditions from about 19 million vehicles worldwide to date, including 85 billion drives and billions of miles driven on U.S. roadways and elsewhere.

As vehicles become more connected and offer more automated features, automakers, governments and service providers want to leverage that data to make roa…

DETROIT — Battery-electric vehicles could command half of the market in the premium segments in as little as five years. Meanwhile, leasing will continue to be a challenge for premium brands as rising interest rates and inflation push up prices, the president of Audi of America said.

Daniel Weissland, 49, who has led Audi of America since 2019, said his brand and others in the premium space can't accurately gauge the true demand for EVs right now because of production constraints that are limiting inventories. But, he said, the growth in acceptance and demand has been surprisingly fast.

"I think the tipping point [to majority EV] is coming much faster than we think in the premium segment," Weissland said during a visit to Automotive News' offices here, putting a five-year time frame on hitting majority EV sales among premium brands. "I could be surprised, because of the Inflation Reduction Act, maybe it's going to accelerate, especially in the …

American Honda Motor Co. has two electric vehicles on the horizon: the Honda Prologue and the Acura ZDX.

Both are co-developed with General Motors and will use the Detroit automaker's new flexible and scalable electric architecture powered by the Ultium battery pack.

The partnership allows Honda to leverage the investments GM has been making in its Ultium drive system and its upcoming wave of EVs while it readies itself for its own zero-emission future.

But one surprise benefit Honda will get from the collaboration could not have been foreseen by any crystal ball: a $7,500 pricing advantage.

When the Prologue and ZDX come to market in 2024, both are likely to land a spot on the coveted list of vehicles approved for the new federal tax credit under the Inflation Reduction Act — thanks to GM's electrification playbook.

This will give the Honda and Acura brands a competitive edge against automakers importing the…

PAHRUMP, Nev. — Countless data points gathered by vehicles every day on public roads can be used to improve safety and traffic flow and speed up emergency response times.

British automotive data startup Wejo hopes to play a major role in getting the auto industry to that point by using data to learn how drivers behave in every use-case scenario.

The goal is to predict what happens "within three meters on this road at this time of day in these specific road conditions," Wejo CEO Richard Barlow said during a demonstration of the company's technology near Las Vegas in late September.

The Manchester-based company has collected data on vehicle and road conditions from about 19 million vehicles worldwide to date, including 85 billion drives and billions of miles driven on U.S. roadways and elsewhere.

As vehicles become more connected and offer more automated features, automakers, governments and service providers want to leverage that data to make roa…