Monthly Archives: September 2018

Announced the UK Mini plant’s annual shutdown will take place on 1^st April (just after Brexit is supposed to take force) rather than during summer so that the plant will be closed in the event of any implementation chaos. (Reuters)
The EU launched a formal investigation into whether BMW, Daimler and VW colluded to restrict competition in emissions technology. (Economic Times of India)
BMW’s development chief said the brand’s cars will always have steering wheels and the change to autonomy will take three decades, starting from 2005, meaning a 20 year wait “until this applies to all parts of the world”. (Autocar)
Radar developer Lunewave raised $5 million from investors including BMW iVentures. (Lunewave)
Published the technical specifications for the new Z4, having earlier unveiled the new car’s design. (BMW)

Co-led a $155 million funding round in electric bus maker Proterra. BMW and GM are existing investors. (ProTerra)
The EU launched a formal investigation into whether BMW, Daimler and VW colluded to restrict competition in emissions technology. (Economic Times of India)
Daimler will retain its Aston Martin stake after the brand’s IPO for at least 12 months. (Aston Martin)

FCA ^(history)

Calsonic (owned by KKR) has reportedly made a €5.8 billion bid for Magneti Marelli and has already lined up financing. Previous reports said FCA wanted €6 billion for the unit and KKR had only offered €5 billion. (Reuters)
Rumoured to be developing a new inline 6 cylinder gasoline engine based on the existing 4 cylinder GME engine. The new product is said to be earmarked for US plants. (Allpar)
The Jeep Wrangler is such a runaway sales success that FCA might add a third shift to the Toledo plant. (The Blade)

Ferrari

Held a capital markets day. Ferrari expects hybrids to account for 60% of its sales by 2022 and plans to create a new line of style-led limited edition models under the Icona banner. (Ferrari)
The first two Icona models will be 1 and 2 seat versions of a roadster named Monza. Final build numbers and pricing are yet to be announced, but are expected to be “less than 500” and more than “£1 million” respectively. (Car)

A French government minister expressed confidence that Punch Powerglide would be announced as the buyer of Ford’s Bordeaux transmissions plant by the end of October. (Reuters)
- Implication: Last time Ford sold the same plant in a government-brokered deal, it ended up taking it back a short time later, having forfeited a substantive dowry. Will it have secured the right to walk away this time?
Ordered by a court in Thailand to pay compensation to owners of vehicles with dud transmissions. (Detroit News)
Paid $90 million for the train station building in Detroit. (Detroit Free Press)
Building all-electric versions of the Transit van (in collaboration with StreetScooter) at its Cologne, Germany site rather than in the Turkish factory that builds ICE powered units. A partially assembled vehicle is shipped from Turkey and then the electric powertrain, cab and cargo structure are added in Germany. (FAZ)
- Implication: Whilst rumours surround the company’s footprint reduction plans in Europe, this decision appears to be based more on its ability to utilise German labour than profit-making potential.

Polestar is hoping to have 75 dealers globally soon after launch, with 10 in the USA. (Fortune)

Simplified its electric vehicles organisation and created a new head of innovation role. (Detroit News)

Honda ^(history)

Continued to lobby against a no deal Brexit saying it would mean tens of millions in tariffs, loads more paperwork and that border controls could play havoc with the 350 daily truck deliveries that keep its Swindon plant stocked with components. The company even made a short day in the life of a trucker video to show it was serious. (BBC)

Nissan (includes Mitsubishi)^(history)

Hyundai invested in holographic display maker WayRay as part of an $80 million funding round. (WayRay)
Hyundai Mobis executives said the company’s L2 ADAS solutions are four years behind those used by German OEMs and that it will take until 2025 to develop full autonomous driving. (Autocar)

Mazda

Lost 44,000 vehicles and 23,000 CKD units in the plant shutdowns caused by flooding earlier in the year. (Mazda)
Continuing to invest in diesel engine technology, saying it is often the “most sustainable” option. (Autocar)

The R-N-M alliance announced a collaboration with Google to use the latter’s Android system for in-car infotainment, with Google Maps providing directions from 2020. (Renault)
Nissan will recall about 240,000 vehicles to fix problems with the brakes that could cause fires. (Detroit News)
Undertaking a minor restructuring in Europe, eliminating around 200 posts. (Chronicle Live)

Called for the French government to resurrect a scheme that gave grants to buyers of plug-in vehicles, and also make it more generous (paying out €2,000 per vehicle instead of the €1,000 payout before the scheme ended). PSA said Renault wanted the same thing but Renault spokespeople declined to comment. (Economic Times of India)
German politicians called on PSA to provide a right of return for Opel employees involved in the proposed Russelsheim technical centre sale to Segula. (FAZ)
In addition to the previously-reported line rate drops at Opel plants, PSA is planning extensive down days with the Eisenach plant reportedly only working eight days during September. (FAZ)
Considering whether to install new manufacturing equipment in Ellesmere Port that could make either CMP or EMP2 based vehicles. (The Times)
The Opel / Vauxhall Grandland X has already reached 100,000 sales and the Eisenach plant will produce it from 2019 onwards. (Opel)

The R-N-M alliance announced a collaboration with Google to use the latter’s Android system for in-car infotainment, with Google Maps providing directions from 2020. (Renault)
Showed EZ-PRO, a concept autonomous vehicle system with “highly modular robo pods” that allow the vehicle to be configured between various jobs such as passenger and goods delivery. Renault is the third major OEM this year to put forward such a solution for high utilisation of urban fleet vehicles. (Renault)
Launched a new round of discounts in the UK, offering £5,000 off some models. (co.uk)

Signed a three year agreement with lithium miner Ganfeng Lithium. (Economic Times of India)

Will invest in a 30 billion yen fund run by Sparx group that will concentrate on sources of renewable energy. (Toyota)

Said it is on track to achieve “capital market readiness” at its truck division (recently named TRATON) by the end of 2018 and investment banking experts will soon be retained for a “potential” IPO. (VW)
Unveiled the production version of the e-tron SUV. Some commentators were disappointed by the car’s performance figures compared to Tesla’s Model X, given the starting price of €80,000. (Audi)
Pulling out of Iran, according to a US government official. (Bloomberg)
Audi launched a pilot subscription service priced at $1,395 per month. Subscribers can change vehicle up to twice per month and choose from a range of A4, A5 cabriolet, Q5 and Q7. In addition, they receive 48 hours of discounted rental (Audi say it is free but taxes and fees are excluded) through Audi’s Silvercar each month. (Audi)
Appears to have slightly altered its outlook on ID pricing to be equal to a “comparable” diesel, implying the vehicle could be more costly than initial expectations if the firm argues the comparator should be high performance. The downside is that a sales target of over 100,000 units is high in the context of high performance diesels. (VW)
Audi’s imprisoned CEO will reportedly be removed from his post at a meeting on September 28^th. (Handelsblatt)
Porsche invested in holographic display maker WayRay as part of an $80 million funding round. (WayRay)
The EU launched a formal investigation into whether BMW, Daimler and VW colluded to restrict competition in emissions technology. (Economic Times of India)
Porsche released details of the modular units that make up its fast charging solution, and will presumably be used by the Ionity charging network. (Porsche)
Seat executives said the brand would have two electric only models by 2021 and two PHEVs by 2020. (Autocar)
Created a training program to develop software competences in-house and will run its first class in 2019. (VW)
SEAT launched the Tarraco large SUV, with sales set for early 2019. (VW)
Showed the ID Buzz van. Although billed as a concept, sources say it could be in production by 2021. (VW)
TRATON signed a cooperation agreement with Hino that will create a shared procurement arm and see the two partners jointly develop electrified powertrain. (VW)
Porsche said it had given up on diesel engines for good. Although there are no cars currently on sale with diesel engines, Porsche had implied it would offer some in future. Now it won’t. (Porsche)

Other

Aston Martin set the price range for its IPO, valuing the firm at between £4.02 billion – £5.07 billion. (Aston Martin)
Aston Martin will sell a limited edition of 19 pairs of cars in collaboration with Zagato. There will be a DB4 Zagato continuation model that will be track-only and a DBS Zagato that they can actually drive on the road. The price for the pair is a cool £6 million (excluding taxes). (Aston Martin)
Aston Martin released a teaser image of a hypercar dubbed “Project 003” that will be released in late 2021 and limited to 500 examples. The company confirmed that there will be space for luggage. (Aston Martin)
Lucid Motors announced it had received over $1 billion in investment from PIF, the same Saudi fund that invested in Tesla (and was the supposed underwriter of the infamous “funding secured” tweet). (Lucid)
Rivian Automotive will unveil its pick-up truck and large SUV in November, saying prices will start at $90,000 but lower specification vehicles with prices of around $50,000 will be available after launch. (Fox News)
Revolution Racecars says it will build a £100,000, 300hp, 675kg track-only two seat sportscar with 300hp. (Autocar)
Elio Motors announced the pre-sale (a pre-ICO?) of the ElioCoin “security token”, hoping to raise $25 million in the scheme. So far it appears to have a single taker. (Elio)
VinFast told local media that its products should be compared with Mercedes and its cars would be priced around 1 billion VND (approximately $43,000). (Vietnam Net)

News about other companies and trends

Economic / Political News

European passenger car registrations in August were 1,171,760 units, up 29.8% on a year earlier. (ACEA)
The German government was rumoured to be leaning towards ordering hardware retrofits for Euro 5 capable diesel vehicles to reduce pollution. (Reuters)
The US announced a new round of tariffs on Chinese products, increasing the likelihood of retaliation. (Reuters)
A German think tank said sales of vehicles with internal combustion engines needed to end before 2030 if the automotive industry was going to contribute enough to reductions in CO₂ This is a different standard to the EU’s proposals for 2030 fleet average CO₂ which would still enable conventionally powered vehicles to be on sale. (The Guardian)
The German government are prepared to offer subsidies of one million euros to get two battery factories built in the country. (Manager Magazin)

Suppliers

BorgWarner held an investor day. (BorgWarner)
ZF will invest €12 billion in electrification and mobility projects over the next five years. (ZF)
Magna is selling its fluid pressure and controls business to Hanon Systems for $1.2 billion. (Hanon Systems)
Holographic display maker WayRay raised $80 million from investors including Porsche and Hyundai. (WayRay)
Wabco will form a joint venture with FAW in China to market brake systems for commercial vehicles. (Autocar)
Varroc and Elba agreed on a lighting components joint venture to be based in Romania. (Autocar)
Valeo and Wabco are partnering to sell their safety technologies for commercial vehicles. (Valeo)

Uber is reportedly in detailed discussion to acquire Careem. (Reuters) It is also said to be in early talks about buying food delivery service Deliveroo. (The Guardian)
Lyft said it had reached the 1 billion trips milestone. (Lyft)
Lyft has partnered with Trafi to add a multi-modal dimension to its app (in some cities). (Trafi)
Didi Chuxing has started to record in-car audio during trips. Passengers must agree as a condition of being allowed to book journeys on the network. (Business Insider)
Ola raised a further $50 million in a deal valuing the company at over $4 billion. (TechCrunch)

Knorr-Bremse and Continental intend to jointly develop a turnkey solution for heavy trucks that will allow them to operate in autonomous platoons. (Knorr-Bremse)
BMW’s development chief said the brand’s cars will always have steering wheels and the change to autonomy will take three decades, starting from 2005, meaning a 20 year wait “until this applies to all parts of the world”. (Autocar)
Radar developer Lunewave raised $5 million from investors including BMW iVentures. (Lunewave)
Leddartech released a white paper discussing the application of lidar for vehicle identification. It contains more data on resolution than is normally disclosed. Even with lidar mounted only a few metres from the vehicle, Leddartech report a resolution of 14cm – 24cm on a target moving at 100 km/h for a 16 line unit, underlining why in practice self-driving vehicle developers are rarely using the units for object identification. (Leddartech)
Bosch invested in lidar developer ABAX Sensing. (Bosch)
The Knight Foundation is spending $5.25 million on a series of experiments in American cities aimed at better understanding the interaction between autonomous vehicles and communities. (Venturebeat)
Self-driving software developer Oxbotica raised £14 million. (FINSMES)
Robosense said its 64 line lidar system will cost under $200 per unit once in mass production. (Robosense)

LG Chem signed a supply agreement with lithium miner Ganfeng Lithium running from 2019-2025. (Economic Times of India)
Start-up CyClean aims to combines zero emissions and cryptocurrency by making electric products, such as electric scooters and solar panels that reward users with the company’s proprietary cryptocurrency for using its products (seemingly paid for in old-fashioned hard currency). (CyClean)
Amazon is going to start offering third party chargers with full installation. (Electrek)
Truckmaker Kamaz and Cummins will develop electric powertrains for heavy vehicles. (Autocar)
VW’s TRATON truckmaking unit signed a cooperation agreement with Hino that will create a shared procurement arm and see the two partners jointly develop electrified powertrain. (VW)
Total acquired French electric vehicle charging provider G2mobility. (Total)

Connectivity

VW’s Traton truck division and Solera announced a strategic partnership to sell fleet management tools. (VW)
The Renault–Nissan–Mitsubishi alliance announced a collaboration with Google to use the latter’s Android system for in-car infotainment, with Google Maps providing directions from 2020. (Renault)
TomTom said it was under pressure as deals like the Google and R-N-M one eat into its mapping revenue. (Reuters)

Other

Electric scooter rental firm Lime has suffered two fatalities in the last few weeks. (TechCrunch)
Amazon reportedly plans to open 3,000 cashless stores by 2021. (Bloomberg)
Trucking firm Convoy raised a further $185 million. (TechCrunch)
Lime said it had reached 11.5 bike and scooter rentals. (TechCrunch) Bird just reached 10 million. (TechCrunch)

Find our archive here.

Auto Industry Briefing — week ending 16th September 2018

September 17, 2018 Ad Punctum TeamAd Punctum, Automotive0

Identikit German electric SUVs; electric vehicle development costing more than expected; and difficult market conditions. Please enjoy our auto industry and mobility briefing for 10^th September to 16^th September. A PDF version can be found here.

Favourite stories of the past week…?

Hangin’ Tough — VW are cutting Golf production, JLR are going to a three day week in Castle Bromwich, BMW say competition is challenging. Is this just a case of bad news coming in threes or are we going to see OEMs becoming increasingly desperate in the market?
For The Love Of Money — VW CEO Herbert Diess said the company is spending more on electric vehicles than planned. Just after Daimler’s CEO said the same thing, not to mention the billions Tesla have spent on developing three cars. It all points to difficulties for the various Chinese companies that have promised to deliver portfolios for $1.5 billion.
The Next Episode — The BMW iNext has put on a few pounds and emerged as an SUV rather than the sleek saloon it was before. After years of cries for more electric vehicles, it seems like there will be loads of them, provided you want a large SUV. Tesla Model S and Model 3 look to have their respective segments to themselves for a while yet. Why have all the Germans decided to build the same car?

News is arranged by company and topic. Stories that apply to more than one company or topic are duplicated.

Find our archive here.

News about the major automakers

Unveiled the iNext, which has morphed from a coupe-like saloon to an SUV. BMW appears to be still undecided on how the car interior should change when the vehicle is in autonomous mode with the steering wheel of the concept retracting “slightly” (in the original demonstrator, the wheel folded away entirely). (BMW)
- Implication: After receiving, and appeared to accept, criticism that the styling of the i3 was too strange and held back sales, BMW seems to have forgotten the lesson entirely with the iNext. It remains to be seen whether the world is ready now in a way it wasn’t a few years ago.
Withdrew all diesel variants from sale in the US, although some cars remain in dealer stock. (Yahoo)
Demonstrated an autonomous motorbike, but unlike competitor projects, BMW does not seem to have tackled the problem of stabilisation, so the vehicle is just as likely to tip over as any other. In BMW’s own words, “at first sight, the autonomous motorbike seems to no real sense”. They say the technology could in future become an active safety system. (BMW)
Working with insurer Swiss Re to use vehicle data to derive a tailored insurance policy for individual owners. (BMW)
Said there were “headwinds” and that several major markets were “highly competitive”, calling out the USA and European markets. (BMW)
BMW’s development chief said OEMs without a cost advantage in electric vehicles will not survive. (Reuters)

Unveiled a new configurable van concept (Vision Urbanetic). It features a running platform with different modules that can be quickly swapped on and off to change roles, for instance between cargo and people movement. (Daimler)
- Implication: Ad Punctum sees reconfigurable platforms as a key enabler to increased vehicle utilisation that can help reduce travel costs per mile. Daimler’s demonstration of such as concept, following from recent efforts by GM, Rinspeed and others, shows the promise of this type of execution.
Concluded the purchase of a 20% stake in VW’s used car sales platform HeyCar. (VW)
Suspended production in South Carolina, USA, because of Hurricane Florence. (Bloomberg)

FCA ^(history)

Hedge fund Tiger Global now owns almost 4% of the company. (Reuters)
KKR offered €5 billion for Magneti Marelli, below the €6 billion FCA wanted, so the search for a buyer continues. The investment bankers who leaked the story implied KKR are welcome to up their offer. (Bloomberg)

Suffered a power failure at the Rouge factory. Ford said the lost F-150s would be caught up. (Detroit News)
Argo AI has licensed its lidar technology to Ball Corporation for use in aerospace and defence projects. (Zacks)
Announced a recall for a small number of vehicles in North America to repair door structures. (Ford)
Ford’s VP in charge of its internet of things platform, spoke at a conference about how rich he was, Ford’s approach to software platform leadership and how it integrates traditional bureaucracy with agile start-up thinking. (Ford)

Geely’s London Electric Vehicle Co subsidiary will put its new taxi-derived van into testing with fleets next year and expects to build 10,000 units at its new factory in 2020, rising to 22,000 per year by 2022. (Autocar)
Finalised its majority stake in Saxo Bank, appointing a new chairman and several board members. (Geely)
Issued a statement saying it had no intention of increasing the 9.69% Daimler stake. (Geely)
Volvo suspended production at its US car factory due to Hurricane Florence. (Bloomberg)
Asked for an exemption for the China-built Volvo XC60 from new US tariffs, dangling the possibility of future US production if sales could continue unabated whilst it ramps up the new South Caroline plant. (Reuters)
Appointed a new CEO for Lotus. (Lotus)

Recalling over 240,000 vehicles to fix brake problems (Detroit Free Press) and 1 million more to sort out steering malfunctions. (USA Today)
CEO Barra said “there’s going to be a point where we’re going to be upgrading and improving cars instead of fixing them”. She also confirmed that GM believes it is on track to launch geofenced operation of driverless vehicles next year but demurred on specifying a timeframe for autonomous features to be available for retail customers to purchase. (Fast Company)

Nissan (includes Mitsubishi)^(history)

Appointed the son of group chairman Chung Mong-Koo as chief vice chairman of Hyundai Motors. (Reuters)
Invested in solid state battery developer (and BMW partner) Solid Power. (Solid Power)
Announced an estate version of the ProCeed. (KIA)
Considering whether to invest in a new generation of diesel engines to meet Euro 7 regulations. (Autocar)

Took a stake in the e.DAMS racing team that will run Nissan’s Formula E entry. (Nissan)
Unions are unhappy with a voluntary redundancy scheme the alliance has offered at its Tamil Nadu, India, plant saying the company should have consulted with them first. (Business Standard)
Believes that car sales in the US may make a partial recovery as interest rate increases and higher gasoline prices may SUVs less affordable. (Bloomberg)

The union leader handling PSA’s proposed sale of Rüsselsheim development activities to Segula said he is cautiously considering the transaction but was not vehemently opposed providing jobs are preserved. (FAZ)
At the unveiling of the new DS3 Crossback executives reiterated the brand’s plans to stop offering diesel and gasoline vehicles by 2025, with only plug in hybrids or full BEVs on sale. (DS)
Gave an update on its aftermarket strategy, including the absorption of Opel and Vauxhall activities. (PSA)

Revealed the facelift for the Kadjar crossover. (Renault)
Unions are unhappy with a voluntary redundancy scheme the alliance has offered at its Tamil Nadu, India, plant saying the company should have consulted with them first. (Business Standard)

Suzuki

Has increased Baleno production in India by 34% over the last eight months, and as a result of lower waiting times sales have risen to 18,000 units each month. (Times of India)
Toyota may add production of Suzuki cars at its plant in Bengaluru, India to utilise surplus capacity. (LiveMint)

Tata (includes JLR)^(history)

JLR’s CEO used a speech at a conference on zero emission vehicles attended by the British prime minister to berate the UK government for its approach to Brexit planning and wondering out loud whether factories would continue to function in the event of a hard Brexit. (Reuters)
Moved to a three-day week at the Castle Bromwich, UK Jaguar plant, due to unspecified headwinds. Sales of models built at the factory have fallen to about 52,500 in the first eight months of 2018 from about 69,000 in the same period last year. (Bloomberg)
Launched a network of charging stations in South Africa to encourage I-Pace buyers. (IOL)

Culling two colours to make manufacturing simpler, but since the colours involved were (highly popular) black and silver and the ability to order “but at a higher price” remains, the move looks more like a way to raise revenue than streamline operations. (Economic Times of India)
Has gone from “production hell to delivery logistics hell” per CEO Musk. Since worldwide distribution of half a million or so vehicles from a single plant is not unknown in the automotive industry, it is not clear whether Tesla faces truly unique problems or has simply failed to plan and execute properly. (Reuters)
Tesla said it was selling the final vehicles that would benefit from lifetime supercharger access. (Electrek)
A small fire stopped work at Tesla’s Nevada Gigafactory for a few hours. (Reuters)
Elon Musk said Tesla was aiming to bring repairs in-house with a target repair time of less than a day. (Reuters)
- Implication: Whilst this appears to fit in with Tesla’s normal mode of vertical integration, this move raises the question of how exactly Tesla decides what is core and non-core? At a time when the firm is still struggling with many operational issues related to designing and building cars, it may be that time spent on body shops could be better used elsewhere.

Working to add production of Suzuki cars at its plant in Bengaluru, India to utilise surplus capacity. (LiveMint)

CEO Diess and the head of the works council gave a joint interview to the in-house magazine. They agreed that complexity must be reduced by having fewer buildable combinations and that more needs to be done to improve VW Groups’s competence in software development, which they attributed to excessive outsourcing (up to 80% of the workload) previously. Diess said a margin of 7% – 8% was required to make the business “crisis proof” and that the cost of introducing electric vehicles will be higher than expected. (VW)
- Implication: Diess becomes the second CEO in a week to admit their company is struggling to contain development costs for electric vehicles (after Daimler CEO Zetsche)
Hopes to sell 10 million units over the lifetime of the MEB platform. (VW)
Rumoured to be exploring alliances with other companies, including fellow OEMs, with the aim of creating a consistent set of technical standards for self-driving vehicles. A VW Group management board review could take place in the coming weeks. (Automotive News)
Added down days in the Wolfsburg factory’s Golf production schedule, apparently because of falling sales rather than WLTP problems. Tiguan production may be replaced as a partial offset. (Handelsblatt)
Sold a 20% stake in VW’s used car sales platform HeyCar to Daimler. (VW)
VW’s trucking division believes autonomous vehicles will catch on more quickly in the US and China because they think the regulators are more open to change. (Handelsblatt)
Porsche launched two short term rental programs on a pilot basis in the US. Porsche Drive is a daily rental offering that competes with similar services from existing major daily rental firms. At a cost of $2,909 for a week’s 911 rental, the pro-rata cost is significantly higher than the monthly “Passport” offering. Porsche Host is a peer-to-peer offering that appears to be a sub-branding of vehicles already available via the Turo app. (Porsche)
Ceasing production of the Beetle in 2019. (Reuters)
Audi owners in Europe will be able to use a single payment service, dubbed e-tron charging service, to access charging points from 220 providers across Europe. (Audi)
Škoda’s unions issued a statement saying it had rejected moves to produce the Superb in Germany. (Times of India)
VW Group has signed new terms with dealers and importers in almost all European markets. (VW)

Other

NIO’s stock market listing had a shaky start with prices falling from the IPO level then recovering. At one point the company was worth around $12 billion. (Reuters)
Aston Martin revealed more technical details about the limited edition Rapide E. Whilst Aston Martin said the performance could be sustained in a way similar to an internal combustion engine car (Aston Martin), the development engineers said that meant it can sustain its top speed of 155 mph for ten minutes. (Autocar)
Gordon Murray Design announced a new version of its iStream flexible platform technology with claimed weight savings of 50% over other types of car body (note: not versus the entire vehicle weight). The company will offer a conventionally powered rolling chassis named T.43 that can be turned into a sports car under licence. (GMD)

News about other companies and trends

Economic / Political News

To the dismay of OEMs, a European Parliament drafting committee backed even harsher proposals for fleet average CO₂ emissions in 2025 and 2030 than had been recommended to them. Against the proposed drop of 15% between 2021 and 2025 and 30% between 2021 and 2030, they called for a 20% reduction by 2025 and a 45% reduction by 2030. National governments still get to weigh in before the rules are finalised. (Reuters)
- Implication: The OEMs may come to regret their energetic yet unconvincing pushback against the original 15% and 30% targets if the draft proposals pass. For some time, lawmakers and manufacturers have been at odds about whether the proposals should increase vehicle costs (lawmakers = yes, OEMs = no). The draft targets look unreachable without application of 48V technology on all internal combustion engines and a heavy mix of PHEVs and BEVs. Currently, the number of fully electric models OEMs plan to have on the market by 2030 could be insufficient to reach that share.
The Chinese government is reportedly taking a dim view of companies that have applied for new energy vehicle permits but then failed to build vehicles and will make it more difficult for them to extend the licence that had previously been the case. (China Daily)

Suppliers

Adient named a new CEO and the interim CEO was made non-executive chairman. (Adient)
Renesas announced the acquisition of chipmaker IDT. (ZDNet)
Gestamp opened a new stampings plant near Wolverhampton, UK at a cost of £50 million. (Gestamp)

Dealers

Online sales start-up Shift announced $140 million in new funding in a round led by Lithia, a large US auto retailer. BMW iVentures (an existing investor) also participated in the round. (Shift)

Go-Jek is looking to raise a further $2 billion to fund expansion and competition with Grab. (Deal Street Asia)
Uber will invest $150 million over five years in Toronto, Canada, increasing the headcount from 200 to 500 and opening a new office. (TechCrunch)
A memo from Didi’s CEO said the company lost 4 billion RMB ($582 million) in the first six months. (Reuters)

Autonomous vehicle developer PerceptIn began sales of its DragonFly autonomous pod, with a $40,000 asking price. The pod is speed limited to 20 mph. (PerceptIn)
Aptiv sees autonomous vehicle fleet sizes of 1,000 cars or more becoming common in the early 2020s and that costs for retail customers will remain too high until at least 2023. The company says Europe is “a bit behind” in the development of autonomous vehicles. (Handelsblatt)
Blackmore released a demonstration video showing how its doppler lidar product can categorise products by relative velocity without post-processing. (Extreme Tech)
Argo AI has licensed its lidar technology to Ball Corporation for use in aerospace and defence projects. (Zacks)
NRG Systems acquired the low cost lidar technology of Israeli firm Pentalum. (Engineer Live)
VW’s trucking division believes autonomous vehicles will catch on more quickly in the US and China because they think the regulators are more open to change. (Handelsblatt)
A UK government-funded research project into autonomous vehicles published its final findings, including data on willingness to pay based on a survey of several hundred people. (Venturer)
ai announced a new CEO, saying founder George Hotz was now head of research. (Comma.ai)
Hyundai Mobis signed a contract with Tata Elxsi to develop a simulation program for autonomous driving by 2019. The partners may find the project harder than they anticipate, especially since photo realistic graphics may be completely unrepresentative of the way AI camera imagery. (Yonhap)
Volvo Trucks presented a concept for an electric and autonomous truck. (Volvo)
- Implication: Judging by the concept’s design, Volvo are in the early stages of autonomous testing since the vehicle features no equivalent structure to the cab — striking in terms of making a design point about new possibilities, but it seems wasteful to not even retain an aerodynamic fairing containing sensors and benefiting from the relatively high vantage point compared to other traffic, especially as a heavier truck would require longer stopping distances and therefore earlier warning is a key advantage.
GM ‘s CEO confirmed the firm is on track to launch geofenced operation of driverless vehicles next year but demurred on giving a timeframe for autonomous features to be available for retail customers. (Fast Company)

Unipart and Williams formed a joint venture called Hyperbat to produce batteries on a vacant Unipart site. The launch customer for the facility will be the Aston Martin Rapide E. The 90 jobs announced in the press release suggest the factory will not have a significant capacity. (Unipart)
ChargePoint intends to have 2.5 million chargers in operation by 2025, up from 45,000 today. (Green Car Reports)
Yamaha is trialling an electric battery swap scheme for scooters in Taiwan, in a pilot that looks very similar to the recently announced partnership between Panasonic and Honda. (Autocar)
Battery developer (and BMW partner) Solid Power raised $20 million, Hyundai was an investor. (Solid Power)
Chinese battery developer Farasis has raised over $1 billion and will build a European factory. (Inside EVs)

Other

HP launched a new metal additive printer called Metal Jet and said VW are a customer for parts made using the machines by suppliers such as GKN. (HP)
Mobike is reportedly undergoing a scrappage program to replace 40,000 bikes in Shenzhen. (Technode)
Brazilian bike sharing start-up Yellow raised $63 million. (TechCrunch)

Find our archive here.

Auto Industry Briefing — week ending 9th September 2018

September 11, 2018 Ad Punctum TeamAd Punctum, Automotive0

Worrying launch sales for Jaguar I-Pace; a different approach to checking autonomous cars are safe; and great electric cars. Please enjoy our auto industry and mobility briefing for 3^rd September to 9^th September. A PDF version can be found here.

Favourite stories of the past week…?

Don’t Give Up — Is everything going okay with the Jaguar I-Pace launch? Five months in and only 140 were sold in August. Just for comparison, F-Pace and E-Pace sold over 5,000 units at the same point in their ramp-up, so it doesn’t seem like JLR have a problem getting the word out about new products. What is going on?
My Favourite Mistake — The self-driving gurus at Aurora have a new perspective on gaining regulatory approval. Rather than driving hundreds of millions of miles, they want to focus on the accuracy of object identification. They believe that once the AI is good enough, the only reason it would make a bad decision is because it didn’t properly identify the pedestrian, or the no left turn signal. They hope to persuade regulators that a mainly safe driving style multiplied by recognition confidence equals probability of an accident. It’s worth a go, but don’t be surprised if it comes back as too theoretical for the liking of most rulemakers.
Off To The Races — The Mercedes EQC was unveiled in production form. Assuming things don’t go awry on pricing, the EQC, Jaguar I-Pace and Audi e-tron are serious entrants into the EV market, alongside Tesla’s efforts. Will the old guard eat Tesla’s dinner, or will they collectively chow down on internal combustion engine sales?

News is arranged by company and topic. Stories that apply to more than one company or topic are duplicated.

Find our archive here.

News about the major automakers

Investing €100 million to build a driving simulation centre that will commence operations in 2020. BMW touts the planned 14 simulators and labs as a significant benefit in developing autonomous vehicles. (BMW)
Will launch a proprietary voice controlled digital assistant in vehicles, starting next year. BMW says the system will be able to interact with third party services such as Alexa (BMW has already created an Alexa skill) and Siri. The BMW system will let users choose their own name — BMW suggests Charlie or Joy as options to be considered. All cars with BMW OS 7.0 and greater will be capable of using the system. (BMW)
- Implication: BMW’s overview of functionality appears to mirror the Mercedes system currently on the market.

Launched production of the Sprinter in a new facility that will employ 1,300 workers once capacity has fully ramped up by 2020. The new facility is said to have cost $500 million. Amazon was announced as a customer for 20,000 vans for use by its delivery agents. For context, annual volume of the van in the US has been about 26,000 units. (Daimler)
Unveiled the production version of the EQC all-electric SUV ahead of sales starting in 2019. (Daimler)
CEO Zetsche said battery electric vehicle sales in 2025 were now considered more likely to be at the lower end of the company’s 15% to 25% of total expectation, based on new bottom-up analysis. (Automotive News)
CEO Zetsche said the company was spending more than the intended €10 billion on electric vehicles but declined to quantify the overrun. (Bloomberg)
Said it has received 2,000 pre-orders for the EQC in Norway. (Reuters)

FCA ^(history)

Investing $30 million in autonomous testing facilities at its Michigan proving grounds. (FCA)
New CEO Manley will announce a reorganization of the executive team by the end of the month. (Reuters)
Workers at FCA’s Serbian plant, which builds the 500L, are concerned about overcapacity. The reported line rate is 410 vehicles per day and unions expect the factory to only work around 150 days this year (the normal level is around 230). The plant has a capacity for around 300,000 cars but will produce only 60,000 in 2018. (B92)

Yet another Jim Hackett profile said the company cancelled its planned electric vehicle just weeks before the 2018 Detroit show and the Mach 1 (the product replacing it in the cycle plan) preview was light on detail because the company had only just begun working on it. CEO Hackett said the company was “four or five months” behind on the rate of progress he expected to make when taking the job. On the possibility of closing down operations in various countries he says “Hackett’s bias is that the Ford brand is iconic” and that “one of my last options is to shut down the Blue Oval in a market. I’d rather never do that”. (Forbes)
Off the record sources have said that Ford is focused on reducing staff in South America and Europe, with the North America region expected to be shielded from any significant restructuring. The plans may reportedly be announced by the end of the year as work with external consulting groups is said to have been under way for several weeks. The concept of selling the operations in any region are reportedly off the table as the company does not want to hand control of the blue oval to anyone else. (Detroit News)
Working on a next generation infotainment system that will feature a larger screen and appear in the new Mach 1 electric vehicle. Ford claims the system was developed in 90 days. (Forbes)
- Implication: Whilst Ford’s recognition of the shortcomings of its existing system are welcome, waiting to introduce it for several years until a new vehicle turns up shows the development process is still far from agile.
Donald Trump tweeted that his new tariffs on Chinese imports meant Ford could make the Focus Active in the USA after all, but Ford said that wasn’t going to happen. (Economic Times of India)
Issued a recall of 2 million F-Series pick-ups to correct problems with seat belt mechanisms that could create sparks inside the body, ultimately leading to fires. (Ford)
Released an image of the Mach 1 electric car, showing a Mustang influenced rear. (Ford)
Stopped all US national advertising campaigns for Fusion, Focus and Taurus, redirecting the money towards SUVs instead. Ford said it preferred discounting the cars to advertising them. (Automotive News)
- Implication: Ford is reversing a recent formula that said well-positioned marketing was preferable to discounting.

Volvo’s CEO said the company was delaying its IPO because market conditions are too volatile. (Reuters)
In cooperation talks with Geely about sharing hybrid electric technology. (Euro News)
Volvo’s CEO had his contract extended to 2022. (Volvo)
Volvo unveiled the 360c autonomous concept car. Volvo says the 360c, with its lounge-like cabin, could become a viable alternative to short haul air travel. Onlookers who remember the Mercedes-Benz F015 might have a sense of déjà vu. (Volvo)
Proton announced that its new SUV will be called the X70. (Proton)

Investing $28 million in its Michigan battery development lab. (Detroit News)
Issued $2.1 billion in unsecured debt, partly to fund pension obligations in the UK and Canada. (GM)
Trademarked “Drivescription” in the US, potentially for use in a future subscription service. (GM Authority)

Nissan (includes Mitsubishi)^(history)

Activist investor Elliott Management wrote an open letter to the company saying it was unhappy with the pace of progress and that Hyundai had fallen silent on the restructuring it previously asked for. (Reuters)
Invested in multi-modal app Migo. (Hyundai)
Local managers said Hyundai will soon build two new models in Turkey, both based on the i20, with a saloon and SUV set to be released. (Daily Sabah)

Looking to expand in the Indian market with twice as many sales and service points (270 today) by 2021. The product strategy will be reshaped with Nissan concentrating on the higher end of the market and more vehicles from the Datsun brand to cater to budget conscious customers. The company will also hire 1,500 people at Indian technical centres. (Nissan)
Increased the range of remanufactured parts available in a bid to retain customers once the warranty period expires by offering lower prices; Nissan says about by 30%. In addition, it is expanding the offering of lower cost consumables. Less clear is how Nissan plans to market the parts to retail consumers and incentivise dealers to offer them. (Nissan)
Nissan’s design chief seemingly confirmed the company is working on a new Z (sports) car. (Which Car)

Developing a voice-based digital assistant in collaboration with SoundHound for launch in 2020. (PSA)
Following earlier rumours that it was looking to spin-off part of Opel’s Rüsselsheim development centre, PSA confirmed it is in talks with French engineering services provider Segula to take over testing facilities for vehicles and powertrain and 2,000 engineers based at the site. Part of the pitch to employees is that Segula aims to deliver non-automotive projects that will make up for the drop in work from GM. (Opel)

Will stop selling rebadged Dacia models as Renaults in emerging markets, preferring to concentrate on the more recent strategy of building Western European looking vehicles on its value (i.e. Dacia) platform. (Automotive News)
Said about 55% of Dacia buyers remain loyal to the brand on renewal and about 10% of sales came from Renault customers. (Automotive News)

Suzuki

Planning four battery electric vehicles for launch in India by 2021 (some of which may run 72V rather than a higher voltage system) and a range of 12V to 72V hybrids in partnership with Suzuki. (Economic Times of India)
Confirmed the transfer of all equity in its Chinese JV to the local partner (Changan) and that Suzuki badged vehicles will continue to be made under licence. (Suzuki)

Tata (includes JLR)^(history)

JLR released a retro-look stereo with smartphone integration and a small touch screen that can fit a single DIN slot of the type used by older vehicles. The unit costs £1,200, plus fitting. (JLR)
Recalled Tata Tigors to rectify emission issues. (Tata)

Tesla’s chief accounting officer resigned after only a month on the job. A bland statement released by Tesla said he still believed in the company and there were no problems with the accounts. Reporters said he felt disrespected by Musk and that people weren’t properly listening to his advice. (CNBC)
Created a new position of automotive president, appointing a current executive. In the announcement, which also covered several other executive moves, CEO Musk said Tesla was expecting to build and deliver more than twice as many cars as in Q2 2018. (Tesla)
Elon Musk gave an extended interview in a 2 hour 40 minute podcast where he talked about his various business ventures and outlook on life. Commentators were more interested in a 20 second segment (from 2:10:25) where he took a drag on a marijuana joint. (YouTube)
- Implication: Many conservative commentators were quick to condemn the move with a debate ensuing about whether: Musk’s actions were legal or not (legal under California state law, illegal under US federal law); violated Tesla’s employee conduct policy (Musk says trace amounts of THX are permissible); if Space X will now lose government contracts because Musk smoked drugs (it won’t).

In cooperation talks with Geely about sharing hybrid electric technology. (Euro News)
Stopped production at four vehicle plants and several supplier factories after an earthquake in Hokkaido. Toyota hopes to restart operations by 13^th (Toyota)
Planning four battery electric vehicles for launch in India by 2021 (some of which may run 72V rather than a higher voltage system) and a range of 12V to 72V hybrids in partnership with Toyota. (Economic Times of India)
Recalling one million cars globally to correct wiring harness problems that could lead to thermal events. (Reuters)

VW’s CFO didn’t rule out an IPO for the group’s luxury car brands, calling it a “legitimate question” but one that was not currently a priority. (Bloomberg)
The investor lawsuit seeking €9 billion in damages for diesel scandal-related losses goes to trial next week. (Reuters)
Self-registered a huge number of vehicles in Germany ahead of WLTP rules coming into force. (Reuters)
Porsche and Schuler created a joint venture for a smart press shop specialising in aluminium. (Porsche)
Škoda concluded a new contract with German dealers. (Autohaus)
Launched the Atlas SUV in Middle Eastern markets, badged at the Teramont. (VW)

Other

Chinese carmaker FAW announced the appointment of Rolls-Royce’s former chief designer and the foundation of a new design centre in Germany that he will head. (FAW)
Aston Martin has recruited a non-executive chair, Penny Hughes, as a precursor to its IPO. (Sky)
Aston Martin opened a showroom dedicated to heritage vehicles. (Aston Martin)
VinFast unveiled the production versions of its forthcoming SUV and saloon. (VinFast)
McLaren’s group CFO said the primary reason for taking on a new shareholder earlier in the year was to fund the cash shortfall resulting from the F1 team’s decision to switch from Honda to Renault engines. (Racefans)

News about other companies and trends

Economic / Political News

US light vehicle SAAR for August was 16.6 million, slightly up on the prior year but down month-on-month. (Wards)
UK registrations of new cars in August were 94,094 units, an increase of 23.1% versus August 2017. (SMMT)
German new car registrations reached 316,405 units in August, up 24.7% on a year over year basis. (KBA)
An Indian government minister said the country had a plan to increase electric vehicle sales to 15% of the total industry within five years and that subsidies were not required. (Business Standard)
Two reports considered by the German government in deciding whether to order a retrofit of SCR exhaust systems onto diesel vehicles put the average cost at between €3,000 – €5,000 per vehicle, with estimates for specific models reaching €9,000. (FAZ)
China’s government is proposing new rules for approving capacity requests that would force companies to show they were properly utilizing existing plants and were intending to export vehicles. (Reuters)

Suppliers

Honeywell’s Garrett division, set for a spin-off, held an investor day. (Honeywell)
Continental’s executive board sent a scathing memo to the company’s senior management saying that many business units were missing internal targets and that personnel changes are being considered. (Handelsblatt)
Denso bought a stake in automated production equipment maker Tohoku Pioneer. (Denso)
Mahle completed its takeover of former JV BTTI. (Mahle)
Despite many saying OEMs are turning away from internal combustion engine development, Mahle announced a new type of piston coating to improve heat distribution inside the combustion chamber. (Mahle) Borg Warner also showcased a new type of turbo aimed at gasoline engines. (Borg Warner)
- Implication: New piston rings and turbos probably need a revised combustion set-up to realise their potential, implying that either Tier 1s are developing solutions and trying to find customers or (more likely) they are aware of several major engine redesigns in the works for the early 2020s.

Grab is looking to raise an additional $1 billion to fund further expansion. (Yahoo)
Lyft started a dockless electric scooter pilot scheme in Denver, USA. (Lyft)
Uber’s CEO said the company was on course for its IPO and was not planning to sell its self-driving arm. (Reuters)
Ride hailing firm Taxify launched dockless electric scooters in Paris, saying the firm was ready to ramp up supply to tens of thousands if the demand was there. (Quartz)
Careem said it had one million drivers on the platform, reaching the milestone slightly ahead of schedule. The company adds between 60,000 – 70,000 drivers per month (Careem)

Mando announced that it had an autonomous vehicle testing permit for California. (Mando)
Denso led a funding round in deep learning specialist ThinCI saying the company provided “5 to 10 times” more computing power and performance than competitors. (Denso)
Waymo’s CTO said the firm was at the point of industrialising the three main pillars of its self-driving solution: sensors; high resolution maps and; the software stack. (Forbes)
Metawave are now claiming 500 metre range for their high resolution radar, having previously said it was over 150 metres and that it believes units will sell for $500 once high volume production begins. In discussing specific examples however the company clarified that the radar might identify a truck with 90% confidence at 300 metres, but a motorcycle with only 50% confidence at the same distance. (All About Circuits)
Aurora’s approach to convincing regulators that self-driving cars are ready is to show that the vehicle is capable of navigating and then present the AI’s history of correct object identification and semantic understanding. The company believes that through this data, it will be possible to agree a likely failure rate. (Wired)

BYD announced a carbon tracking and banking scheme in partnership with VeChain. The initiative will collect trip data and parts usage information. (BYD)
VinFast will use LG Chem batteries and they will produce battery packs together in Vietnam. (VinFast)
JLR reportedly have chosen Samsung SDI to provide the batteries for next-generation battery electric vehicles. LG Chem supply the batteries for I-Pace. (Korea Times)
Suzuki and Toyota are reportedly planning battery electric vehicles running on 72V, rather than a higher voltage, for the Indian market. The partners had previously said the system was low cost. (Economic Times of India)
An Indian government minister said the country had a plan to increase electric vehicle sales to 15% of the total industry within five years and that subsidies were not required. (Business Standard)
A group of large UK commercial vehicle fleets have agreed to replace a combined 18,000 diesel vans with electric ones instead. (UN Climate Action Program)
Lion Smart demonstrated the potential energy density benefits of next generation batteries by fitting a 100 kWh battery into a BMW i3 (normal capacity = 33 kWh). (Green Car Reports)

Other

ParkWhiz raised $20 million in new funding. The service it reaches 40 million customers and has been used by seven million of them. (ParkWhiz)#
Vertical Aerospace’s founder said his company will have flying taxis in service within the next four years. (Reuters)
Fleet management platform Avrios raised $14 million. (TechCrunch)

Find our archive here.

Auto Industry Briefing — week ending 2nd September 2018

September 3, 2018 Ad Punctum TeamAd Punctum, Automotive0

Untrustworthy third-party speculation about Tesla; one more thing driverless cars need to prove; and Waymo’s rollout plan. Please enjoy our auto industry and mobility briefing for 27^th August to 2^nd September. A PDF version can be found here.

Favourite stories of the past week…?

Upside Down — Tesla have no chance of meeting their quarterly production target for Model 3, unless Tesla are on course to exceed their Model 3 target. You almost feel sorry for Elon Musk; does it really matter what this quarter’s number is? Isn’t the more interesting conversation around why Model 3 launch was so badly botched and what Tesla will do differently next time?
She Drives Me Crazy — Waymo’s test fleet in Phoenix is getting on the nerves of local drivers, some of whom admit to illegal overtaking manoeuvres to get in front of the cautious machines. It raises an interesting question around regulation and certification. In addition to verifying the cars drive themselves safely, how will we prove that they don’t make other drivers more dangerous? And if they do, but only by a little bit, could there still be a moral argument for widespread introduction?
God’s Plan — Waymo (again — sorry) have reached nine million testing miles, they are currently running at a rate of about one million miles per month (and slightly accelerating). There are agreements in place with FCA and JLR for tens of thousands of cars, plus a long-rumoured tie up with Honda. Unless Waymo will recruit tens of thousands of safety drivers and run a ride hailing service at a loss (as proved by Uber and Lyft), then how are they intending to verify the AI is safe before these vehicles come into the fleet? At the rate they are going, they simply won’t have covered a meaningful real-world distance compared to fatal accident occurrence. Do they have an inside track on a regulatory view saying that’s okay? Is it a massive gamble? Or is it just good PR and the announced contracts mean nothing?

News is arranged by company and topic. Stories that apply to more than one company or topic are duplicated.

Find our archive here.

News about the major automakers

South Korean police raided BMW’s headquarters in the country as part of an investigation into engine fires that have been the subject of a massive recall. (Economic Times of India)
Will unveil the iNext by taking journalists inside a specially equipped cargo aeroplane, showing them the car and then flying off into the sunset. (BMW)
Requested planning permission for an extension at the Swindon pressings site that supports BMW’s UK Mini plant. BMW requested a five year consent before implementation has to take place, rather than the usual three years to provide “flexibility on the potential for investment”. (Insider Media)
- Implication: The planning consent bears all the hallmarks of a Brexit hedge.

Said that Daimler’s various mobility brands (excluding companies where Daimler has a small shareholding) have a combined 24.4 million customers. (Daimler)
StreetScooter revealed that Daimler’s benchmarking team had posed as representatives of a nursing home to get hold of a unit for evaluation. (Der Spiegel)

Moody’s downgraded Ford’s credit rating to Baa3, the lowest investment grade, and gave the company a negative outlook saying that a downgrade to junk status could come in mid-2019 without evidence that the company has a plan to improve its competitive position. (Detroit Free Press)
Will not sell the Focus Active in the US as planned, blaming US tariffs for ruining the business case and saying that since annual volume would be lower than 50,000 units, US production would not be worthwhile. (Bloomberg)
Tongues were set wagging by newspaper articles saying that Ford’s European, and especially UK plants, operations could see drastic job cuts in a bid to improve profitability. (Sunday Times)
- Implication: The articles mainly collated existing information in the public domain: Ford is planning a massive restructuring program; the factory in Dagenham only makes diesel engines; the Bridgend engine factory only has announced new business that would support around a third of the workforce from 2020 onwards; Ford is dropping the US version of the Mondeo (Fusion) and has sent letters to suppliers indicating the European model will not be renewed circa 2020, but the China model will. Not mentioned in the article, but also relevant to the European business is that the company is openly working towards a disposal of the Bordeaux transmissions plant.
The scope of Ford and VW’s collaboration — seemingly dubbed Project Cyclone — reportedly currently covers several sizes of commercial vehicle and light pick-up trucks (Ranger / Amarok). VW insisted that no firm commercial decisions had been taken. (Handelsblatt)

Will develop driver assistance systems for Geely branded cars with Smart Eye (Geely)
Unveiled the production version of the Lynk&Co 03. It looks virtually identical to the “concept” version. (Autocar)
Proton has reportedly signed an agreement with Al Hajj Motors to assemble and sell electric cars in Pakistan. (Times of Islamabad)

Executives said the company will “probably have a different solution” for supply of small diesel engines that are currently sourced from Opel, once the model is upgraded. (Automotive News)
Said the new 6 cylinder diesel will be followed by smaller engines based on the same modular structure, with an I4 and possibly I3 in the works. GM also thinks that next generation diesel hybrids may help to stabilise the market share of the fuel type. (Automotive News)

Honda ^(history)

Had to temporarily stop production at the Marysville, USA plant due to a disgruntled axe-wielding worker. (WHIO)

Planning to export large numbers of Chinese-built cars to Southeast Asia to better utilise surplus capacity in the country. Although Hyundai said no final decision had been made, the Chinese JV partner said it has. (Reuters)

Experienced 308 production stoppages because of a shortage of 6 speed manual gearboxes, a reported 12,000 vehicles have been lost. (Reuters) CEO Tavares encouraged workers at the Valenciennes plant to lift gearbox production from 1,800 units per day to 3,000, but is receiving pushback from unions. (France Info)
Confirmed all Groupe PSA passenger cars have completed WLTP certification. (PSA)
The CO₂ output of PSA vehicles rose between 24% to 31%, depending on the model, under WLTP. (Les Echos)
- Implication: Following reporting around potential inflation of WLTP test results to provide an easier post-2021 glidepath, the PSA figures appear consistent (albeit slightly higher) with prior testing by the EU which indicated an average CO₂ increase of 21% for cars and 30% for vans.
Said it was investigating the potential of manufacturing a new vehicle at Poissy. It seems likely that this would be a B-sized car, based on the plant’s current facilities. (PSA)
Despite PSA’s recent efforts to reduce complexity, the Opel Corsa still boasts nine different windscreen and wiper combinations. (Bloomberg)
Consolidating sales offices and parts warehouses in the UK following the Opel / Vauxhall takeover, a move that affects 200 UK jobs. (Coventry Telegraph)

Renault’s big Paris motor show reveal plans fell apart after the concept car was spotted on a photo shoot. (Motor 1)

Tata (includes JLR)^(history)

A UK motor magazine said the F-Type replacement will have a mid-engined layout, with an all-electric version due by the mid 2020s. (Auto Express)

Experienced network connectivity issues with access to some functions, repeating an issue seen a couple of years ago. Driving using the key was not affected, good news for everyone except Model 3 owners. (Electrek)
Reduced the price difference between specifying driver assistance features before delivery and activating them later to $500, from $1,000 previously. The move is supposedly only temporary until the end of September and is surely not an attempt to improve earnings before the quarter end. (Electrek)
Reportedly struggling to reach the production targets for Model 3 Tesla set after declaring it had reached 5,000 units per week — and has been unable to even sustain that level. (Electrek) Unless you believe that the company is comfortably exceeding 5,000 units per week and may be up to 6,000 per week as planned. (Detroit News)
Added a new pin-to-drive feature to overcome weaknesses in security that allow car thieves to hijack the signal from the key and steal the vehicle. (Electrek)

Invested $500 million in Uber and announced a collaboration to create purpose-built autonomous vehicles (based on the Toyota Sienna minivan) that will run on Uber’s network with an initial fleet in service from 2021. (Toyota)
Will drop the Auris name in Europe and use Corolla instead when the C-sized hatchback is replaced. (Toyota)
Unveiled the updated Lexus RC sportscar. (Lexus)

Looking at introducing a mandate for managers to choose plug-in or full electric vehicles on the company car scheme with a view to substantial numbers of electrified cars entering the 20,000-strong fleet from 2019 onwards. One alternative is charging managers choosing non-electrified vehicles more. (Handelsblatt)
- Implication: If the scheme was successful in wholesale changing the behaviour of VW Group managers, it would have quite a profound effect on the German second hand market with tens of thousands of nearly new vehicles looking to find a home.
Leaked documents reportedly show that all VW automatic transmissions have special test-only shift programs, meaning that gasoline vehicles could also have unrepresentative test results. The real world impact was not quantified and VW’s PR team seemed unconcerned by the rumour. (Handelsblatt)
Will build an assembly plant in Ghana and increase the capacity of existing operations in Nigeria. (VW)
Ford and VW’s collaboration — seemingly dubbed Project Cyclone — has worried employees at VW’s Hannover factory who do not want to have to compete with Ford’s Turkish operations for supply contracts. The project scope is reportedly currently covering several sizes of commercial vehicle and light pick-up trucks (Ranger / Amarok). VW insisted that no firm commercial decisions had been taken. (Handelsblatt)
Buyers seeking to leapfrog the waiting list for the Bugatti Chiron now have another option, a 1,000,000 piece kit developed with Lego. Performance is reduced with a top speed of only 20 km/h but the plus side is that no glue is required so the blocks can be reused for another project if you tire of it. (Engadget)
Porsche’s rule of thumb is that battery energy density increases 5% each year and the company is working on charging at a higher rate than the already announced 350 kW. (Porsche)
Škoda executives said the brand was considering building a new car plant and that the UK was one of the possible sites, albeit a rank outsider. (Autocar)
Said that WLTP certification for VW brand cars will be completed by the end of September, however only half of the models made the cut-off to continue sales without interruptions. (The Sun)
Production of the Audi e-tron SUV has started even though the car has yet to be (officially) unveiled. (VW)
Opened a new plant in Tianjin, China with annual capacity of 300,000 units to produce VW and Audi badged SUVs with joint venture partner FAW. (VW)

Other

Dyson submitted a planning request for a new test track at its existing development centre saying the envisaged £200 million investment aimed to create a “world-class” site. (CNBC)
- Implication: Dyson’s development centre seems worrying small for vehicle development (10 miles of test track), as a comparator, the Ford test centre in Lommel, Belgium, has around 100km of track.
Aston Martin published a registration document ahead of its intended IPO. (Aston Martin)
Koenigsegg said Spyker had yet to purchase any engines from them under a supply agreement announced last year, implying the company hasn’t been making any cars (although there is an outside chance they have just carried on using Audi engines). (Motor 1)
Koenigsegg said the unveiling of the Tesla Roadster has motivated the company to explore new ways to improve performance and that the company believes it can reach 250 mph in 14 seconds. (The Drive)
Faraday Future said pre-production builds were underway at its new factory. (Faraday)
Chinese brand GAC Motor said it will launch in Russia during 2019. (GAC Motor)
Unlike the US president’s bespoke Cadillac, Vladimir Putin’s new state limousine, the Aurus Senat, is now on sale and will be available to oligarchs and proletariat alike. Lenin would surely have approved. (Autocar)
SSC unveiled the Tuatara supercar. Powered by an engine with a claimed output of 1,750 hp, the company has set a top speed goal of greater than 300 mph. Production will be limited to 100 units. (SSC)

News about other companies and trends

Economic / Political News

French August passenger car registrations of 150,391 vehicles were up a whopping 40% versus a year earlier. (CCFA)
Italy registered 91,551 passenger cars in August, up 9.5% on a year earlier. (UNRAE)
Spanish passenger car registrations in August were 107,692 units, up 48.7% on a year earlier. (ANFAC)
The US government said it had agreed a new trade deal with Mexico to replace NAFTA and will proceed on a bilateral basis if talks with Canada about the terms fail. (Detroit Free Press)
The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator said he was opposed to the UK’s proposal for a common rulebook that is outside the single market. His concerns centre on the fact that the EU would be obliged to offer such a deal to any third country willing to accept the terms, an issue that the UK appears to have ignored. (The Guardian)
EU chief Junker said that his recent agreement with US president Donald Trump was a “kind of ceasefire” and that the EU would retaliate with tariffs if the US government did so. Trump reportedly rejected a proposal to remove all tariffs on cars shipped between the EU and USA because of “consumer habits”. (Times of India)
Japan’s government said it intends to stop sales of all non-electrified models by 2050 and will prepare draft legislation to that effect. (Argus)
UK dealers blamed WLTP for a reported a fall in orders for September versus a year earlier. (Motor Trader)

Suppliers

Sensor supplier Murata will build a new plant in Finland, opening in 2019 and creating 150-200 jobs. (Murata)
Continental is opening a new plant in Changshu, China for turbocharger hoses. (Continental)

Uber is reportedly designing its own electric scooter for subsidiary Jump to use in preference to buying them from external suppliers. (Bloomberg)
- Implication: Uber’s entry into hardware might inform the company’s approach to vehicles, particularly if this project does not go well.

Russian ride hailing firm Yandex has begun an on-road pilot of autonomous vehicles. The two car fleet runs between set destinations; the customer experience is therefore more like an on-demand bus. (Yandex)
Lidar developer Blickfeld reportedly raised an additional $6 million. (Evertiq)
A crash test report by Apple confirmed that the company’s test fleet is being used in autonomous mode on public roads. (California DMV)
Waymo’s test fleet is getting rave reviews from its users but drivers who encounter the vehicles frequently are being driven to distraction — and in some cases illegal evasion manoeuvres. (The Information)
Waymo’s fleet completed its nine millionth mile of testing. (Waymo)
- Implication: The fleet is now accruing around one million miles of autonomous driving each month — it remains to be seen how the company intends to demonstrate sufficient safety to be able to use all the vehicles it has signed supply agreements for.
A UK consortium including JLR have been testing autonomous pods with big eyes. (Mashable)
Toyota invested $500 million in Uber and announced a collaboration to create purpose-built autonomous vehicles (based on the Sienna minivan) that will run on Uber’s network with an initial fleet in service from 2021. (Toyota)
- Implication: It isn’t clear how this will affect Uber’s previous announcement to buy a fleet of Volvo XC90 SUVs, potentially the two will be separate, with Uber mounting its own technology on the Volvo vehicles whilst Toyota provides more of a turnkey solution.