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Giovanni Circella, director of the 3 Revolutions Future Mobility Program at UC Davis, discusses the institute’s studies of electrification, automation, and shared mobility, the role it plays in training mobility experts, and how the pandemic is changing the landscape.

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SHANGHAI — With the coronavirus outbreak largely contained since March in China, the local market for new passenger vehicles and light trucks has sustained growth for five straight months.

But there has been little to celebrate for American brands here. Except for Tesla, demand for U.S.-brand vehicles remains subdued, leaving many of their dealers struggling in the red.

The worst performer among them is Jeep. While China's overall market has returned to growth mode, Jeep sales are stuck in a downward spiral that began in 2018.

FCA Group now produces vehicles for only the Jeep brand in China. It assembles the gasoline and plug-in hybrid variants of the Grand Commander as well as the gasoline models of the Renegade, Compass and Cherokee at its joint venture with GAC Motor Co.

In September, Jeep sales fell 36 percent from a year earlier to 3,862, with year-to-date volume plummeting 47 percent to 27,675, according to GAC…

The GMC Hummer EV, unveiled last week to fanfare and memories of the original gas guzzlers with the same badge, is more than an expensive showpiece. It's a crucial element of General Motors' plan to scale electric vehicle production.

The pickup is "going to lead to all the learnings from a battery standpoint, from a volume standpoint, from a build standpoint," GM President Mark Reuss told investors last week. "All of those lessons as we roll out this truck will be taken into every one of the old GM platforms."

Hummer also sets the tone for bringing EVs to fruition quickly. GM has said it will launch 20 EVs by 2023. It unveiled the Hummer pickup just 18 months after development work began, and that timetable will become the standard for GM vehicles, Hummer chief engineer Al Oppenheiser said.

"Our leadership has challenged us to bring the Hummer EV to market fast, using our analytical tools, our computer-aided engineering and less phy…

Volvo Car USA's newest crossover signals the next chapter of the Swedish automaker's evolution.

The 2021 Volvo XC40 Recharge P8, arriving in U.S. stores early next year, is the awkwardly named vanguard of a portfolio of emissions-free models.

"Electrification by far is the highest priority in the company," Volvo Car USA CEO Anders Gustafsson told Automotive News last week.

Volvo's bet on electrification is bold: Make battery-powered vehicles account for half of its global sales by 2025, with the rest being hybrids. To get there, Volvo is adopting a two-step strategy: Push plug-in hybrids in the near term as the EV lineup — and customer adoption — evolves.

"We have decided to go in very strong with our PHEVs," Gustafsson said, noting Volvo commands a 23 percent share of plug-in hybrid sales in the U.S. luxury segment.

Volvo discontinued California sales of its T6 twin-turbocharged four-cylinder engine for the XC90 large crossover. Volvo now…

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…