News

<!--*/ */ /*-->*/ They're baaaaack! Reports of the demise of auto shows were ... well ... way wrong

We're so vain.

We in the media probably thought auto shows were about us.

And who would blame us? For decades, automaker execs crashed through convention center windows, rappelled from hall ceilings and herded cattle on nearby streets, all in a bid to capture more "media buzz" than their rivals.

And when they decided that spending a million dollars or more for a 20-minute time slot wasn't worth it anymore, we started in with our "wither auto show" headlines.

And sure, that may actually have applied to the biggest venues, mainly Detroit's North American International Auto Show. Pullouts by high-profile German automakers prompted Detroit into some soul searching that resulted in its move away from its traditional snowy January format.

But in the rest of the U.S., it's been a different matter. According to Foresight Research, …

WASHINGTON -- Ford Motor Co. is recalling nearly 617,00 Explorers in the United States at the request of regulators because retention pins could loosen and allow roof rail covers to detach from the vehicle.

The recall covers 2016 through 2019 model year vehicles. Dealers will install push-pins and replace any damaged rail clips and roof rail covers, as necessary.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in April had requested Ford conduct a safety recall after first inquiring about the issue in early 2020 following 11 reports of roof rail cover detachment.

Ford in November approved a onetime repair and extended coverage action for 10 years or 150,000 miles to address the issue.

Billionaire Elon Musk dropped a surprise early in his hotly anticipated turn as host of "Saturday Night Live," saying in his monologue that he "is the first person with Asperger's" to host the show, before clowning through skits for the first global livestream of the NBCUniversal comedy show.

Musk, the CEO of Tesla Inc. and one of the world's richest individuals, opened his monologue by telling an audience in more than 100 countries he is "the first person with Asperger's to host SNL. At least the first to admit it." The billionaire made light of his tendency to speak in a monotone, adding "I'm pretty good at running human in emulation mode."

Asperger's syndrome is a condition on the autism spectrum that is associated with difficulty in social interaction, and sometimes is referred to as high functioning autism.

Comedian and Saturday Night Live alumni Dan Aykroyd has spoken in interviews about being diagnosed with a mild form of Asperger's. He hosted Sa…

Anthony Foxx, former secretary of the U.S. Department of Transportation, discusses President Biden’s infrastructure proposal, the appeal of removing certain highways and ways to ensure all communities benefit from transportation’s future.

How do I subscribe?

Apple Podcasts: “Shift: A podcast about mobility” is available on the iTunes Store and through the ‘Podcast’ app pre-installed on all iOS devices. Click here to subscribe.

Spotify: "Shift: A podcast about mobility" can be streamed through Spotify on your desktop, tablet or mobile device. Click here to subscribe.

Google Play: "Shift: A podcast about mobility" is available on Android devices through the Google Play store. Click here to subscribe.

DETROIT — The microchip shortage has taken a bigger toll on General Motors' production plans than on Ford Motor Co.'s. But financially, the two automakers have very different outlooks for the remainder of the crisis.

While Ford says it will earn relatively little profit for the rest of the year, GM believes it has found a path through the storm that will largely shelter its bottom line.

By shutting down production of lower-profit crossovers and sedans for months, GM has been able to funnel its limited chip supplies to its most lucrative plants. It has continued to churn out high-profit pickups and SUVs without interruption.

"The trucks are the profit center of the Detroit 3," said Sam Fiorani, vice president at AutoForecast Solutions. "Keeping them in production is a large part, if not all, of their profits. GM has the benefit of having lower-demand, lower-profit cars in their lineup to remove from production, where Ford had already gotten rid of all th…

Larry Van Tuyl, who six years ago sold his portfolio of 81 dealerships to Warren Buffett-led Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in the industry's largest buy-sell transaction, is once again a dealership owner.

Van Tuyl, 71, told Automotive News last week that he now owns four stores, including three dealerships in a Phoenix suburb. He closed on the purchase of a Honda store in Houston on May 3.

And Van Tuyl is on the hunt for more dealerships.

He expects to close on additional acquisitions this year, he said.

"I don't know if that'll be 10 deals or 50 deals," Van Tuyl said. "We'll just see what the opportunities are."

After the March 2015 sale of Van Tuyl Group of Phoenix, then the largest privately held dealership group in the U.S., to Berkshire Hathaway, Van Tuyl said he spent five years as chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Automotive.

He told Automotive News that he had agreed to stay on as chairman for…

Even though COVID-19 upended the auto industry last year, shut down production lines for weeks and forced executives to reevaluate the long-term viability of their businesses, some suppliers now think 2021 is even worse.

The list of challenges is long and getting longer, Julie Fream, CEO of the Original Equipment Suppliers Association, said last week during an Automotive News Congress Conversations webcast.

"I think suppliers are navigating more than they ever have," Fream said as part of an industry panel. "Surprisingly, 2021 has become a more challenging and difficult year for suppliers than even 2020 was.

"At that point, the industry went down and then we came back up," she added. "But it is such a challenge to navigate all of these individual areas that are causing concerns and problems for suppliers."

All of the stumbling is making the industry painfully aware of its lack of visibility into its supply chain, added Mary Buchzeiger, CEO of me…

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 …

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…

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 …

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…