BERLIN, May 17 (Reuters) – European new car registrations increased in April, data from the region’s carmaker association showed on Wednesday.

The number of new vehicles registered that month in the European Union, Britain and the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) grew by 16.1% to 964,932 units, the European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) said.

Continue reading “European car sales rise in April, ACEA says”

BERLIN, May 17 (Reuters) – German carmaker Volkswagen (VOWG_p.DE) plans to overhaul its core brand to increase efficiency and returns, according to an internal memo from VW brand chief Thomas Schaefer seen by Reuters on Wednesday.

“We can see that our brand – despite all its strengths – is not yet on a sufficiently solid economic footing,” Schaefer wrote in the memo.

Continue reading “Volkswagen plans core brand revamp to boost returns -internal memo”

CHICAGO, May 17 (Reuters) – The U.S. supply chain is healing from early pandemic shocks that sent shipping costs skyrocketing and squeezed supplies of everything from toilet paper to pasta, but more than three years later, material shortages and hiring woes linger.

Rates for trucking, ocean shipping and other transportation tumbled after U.S. consumers shifted spending from big-ticket items like furniture, BBQ grills and big-screen TVs to travel and other entertainment, offering a reprieve to beleaguered shippers.

Continue reading “US supply chain woes shift and persist in 2023”

PTI– “As the world’s third-largest auto market, India is a ripe target for EV firms. Sales of EVs more than doubled last year in the country. This was, however, off a low base. EV sales represented less than 2% of the total light-vehicle sales in the last 12 months,” the report said.

SHANGHAI/BEIJING, May 17 (Reuters) – BYD Co Ltd (002594.SZ), may be China’s biggest electric vehicle maker by a country mile but it knows it lags rivals in autonomous driving, and has set up a new division and embarked on a huge hiring spree to rectify that shortcoming.

Between 4,000 and 5,000 software engineers have been hired recently, BYD senior vice president Stella Li told an investor forum this month when quizzed why the automaker was behind in automation and intelligence technologies.

Continue reading “China’s BYD beefs up autonomous driving credentials with new unit, hiring spree”

MUNICH, May 17 (Reuters) – Hyundai Motor Co’s (005380.KS) European chief said the carmaker was not making a direct change to its pricing in response to Tesla’s (TSLA.O) price cuts, adding consumers needed reassurance that prices wouldn’t go up and down.

“We are not taking what I’d call a knee-jerk reaction to what the competition does… we know that Tesla’s pricing will alert some consumers to consider Tesla that hadn’t before, so of course you have to look at that,” Hyundai Motor Co Chief Executive for Europe Michael Cole said at the Reuters Automotive Conference in Munich.

Continue reading “Hyundai Europe CEO: we won’t take a “knee-jerk reaction” to Tesla”

LONDON, May 17 (Reuters) – Britain’s finance minister Jeremy Hunt on Wednesday said the country needs to have electric vehicle (EV) battery making capacity, speaking at a British Chambers of Commerce event.

“Watch this space because we are very focussed on making sure that the UK gets EV and manufacturing capacity,” he said.

Continue reading “UK’s Hunt say Britain needs EV battery making capacity: “Watch this space””

BEIJING, May 15 (Reuters) – Ford (F.N) said on Monday it was working to reduce costs in China as it strives to recover from a long sales slump in the world’s largest auto market.

“Our costs are not competitive, and we are working internally and with our partners to reduce costs in all areas,” a representative of Ford China told Reuters in a statement.

Continue reading “Ford says it will reduce costs to boost China business”

OTTAWA, May 15 (Reuters) – Automaker Stellantis (STLAM.MI) has stopped construction at a more-than C$5 billion ($3.7 billion) electric-vehicle battery plant in Canada amid talks with the federal government about its support for the factory.

“Effective immediately, all construction related to the battery module production on the Windsor site has stopped,” a spokesperson said, while adding that some construction related to battery cell production continues.

Continue reading “Stellantis blocks battery plant construction as more support sought”

LONDON, May 15 (Reuters) – Rising demand from automakers, industry and investors will push the global platinum market into its biggest deficit in years, three industry reports predicted on Monday.

The reports underline an emerging change in fortunes for platinum and its sister metal palladium, both used chiefly in vehicle exhausts to neutralise harmful engine emissions.

Continue reading “Platinum facing biggest deficit in years as carmakers snap up metal”

OAKLAND, California May 15 (Reuters) – Silicon Valley automotive ethernet chip startup Ethernovia Inc said on Monday it had raised $64 million in a Series A funding round including Porsche Automobil Holding SE (PSHG_p.DE), Qualcomm Ventures, VentureTech Alliance and others.

As automakers pivot to electric vehicles with more driver assistance functions, they are revamping the electronics to eliminate dozens of cables that crisscross the car linking up over 100 microchips. Instead, they are building a central computer to control everything from camera and radar sensors to the windows and the entertainment dashboard.

Continue reading “Silicon Valley automotive ethernet chip startup Ethernovia raises $64 mln”

PARIS, May 14 (Reuters) – France is poised to win record foreign investment pledges when President Emmanuel Macron receives global business leaders, including Tesla’s Elon Musk, on Monday at the annual “Choose France” summit in Versailles.

For the president, whose popularity has suffered from a widely unpopular proposal to raise the French retirement age, the summit is a chance to justify his pro-business reform drive and shift attention to his promotion of lower carbon industry, such as electric vehicles.

Continue reading “Macron courts Tesla’s Musk and others to ‘Choose France’”

May 15 (Reuters) – Americans in the waning days of the COVID pandemic are keeping their combustion-engine vehicles longer, according to a new study.

The average age of U.S. cars and light trucks this year climbed to a record 12.5 years, reflecting the impact of supply constraints on dealer inventories of new vehicles in 2022, as well as reduced consumer demand from higher inflation and interest rates, according to the study by S&P Global Mobility.

Continue reading “US consumers keep vehicles for a record 12.5 years on average -S&P”

TOKYO, May 15 (Reuters) – The weekend gathering of finance chiefs from the Group of Seven (G7) advanced economies did not single out China as a threat in their communique, but left signs the world’s second-largest economy will loom large at this week’s summit in Hiroshima.

Efforts to grapple with China’s growing global presence were evident at the three-day G7 finance chiefs’ gathering in Niigata, Japan, during which they held their first outreach in 14 years, aimed at winning over emerging nations.

Continue reading “China’s rising clout spotlighted at finance chief meetings before G7 summit”

PTI – The company has leadership in the budget bike segment (100-110cc) and is looking to enhance presence in the 125 cc and also drive in models to bring in volumes and enhance profitability in the 160-cc and above space.

WASHINGTON, May 12 (Reuters) – The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) demanded the recall of 67 million air bag inflators because it believes there is a safety defect, but auto supplier ARC Automotive Inc rejected the U.S. regulator’s request, documents released on Friday show.

The auto safety agency said the inflators pose an unreasonable risk of death or injury.

Continue reading “U.S. demands recall of 67 million air bag inflators”

WASHINGTON, May 12 (Reuters) – General Motors (GM.N) said on Friday it will recall nearly 1 million sport utility vehicles in the United States because the driver’s air-bag inflator may explode during deployment.

The recall covers 994,763 Buick Enclave, Chevrolet Traverse, and GMC Acadia vehicles from the 2014 through 2017 model years with modules produced by ARC Automotive Inc. Dealers will replace the driver’s air-bag module.

Continue reading “GM recalling nearly 1 million U.S. vehicles for air bag defect”

BEIJING, May 12 (Reuters) – China’s market regulator said Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) will fix software in more than 1 million vehicles to reduce the chance of accidents, the regulator said on Friday.

The action is described as a product recall under Chinese regulations, the regulator said, but it was not immediately clear if drivers might need, or would be eligible, to return vehicles to Tesla for refunds.

Continue reading “China says Tesla to fix software for 1.1 mln cars on braking issue”

TOKYO, May 12 (Reuters) – Toyota Motor Corp (7203.T) said on Friday the vehicle data of 2.15 million users in Japan, or almost the entire customer base who signed up for its main cloud service platforms since 2012, had been publicly available for a decade due to human error.

The incident, which also affected customers of its luxury brand Lexus, comes as the world’s biggest automaker by sales makes a push into vehicle connectivity and cloud-based data management which are seen as crucial to offering autonomous driving and other artificial intelligence-backed features.

Continue reading “More than 2 million Toyota users face risk of vehicle data leak in Japan”

PTI – The plants will be commissioned at Kharkhoda, Sonipat in Haryana and SMG Suppliers’ Park in Gujarat, the company said in a statement. The new plant in Sonipat will provide capacity enhancement so as to meet the requirements of Maruti Suzuki’s new manufacturing plant at IMT Kharkhoda which is expected to be commissioned by FY2025, it added.

PTI – “We will continue to make investments aggressively to grow the industry and make people happy in India and continuously contribute to Atmanirbhar Bharat,” Suzuki Motor Corporation Executive VP Kenichi Ayukawa said. In a tweet shared by the Finance Ministry, Ayukawa said Maruti Suzuki India has announced an increase in annual production capacity by one million units last month.

PTI – State-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) has discovered crude oil and natural gas in two blocks in Mumbai offshore, the company said on Thursday without giving details of reserves found. The discoveries, which have been named ‘Amrit’ and ‘Moonga’, were made in the blocks that the company won in recent open acreage licensing rounds.

State-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) has discovered crude oil and natural gas in two blocks in Mumbai offshore, the company said on Thursday without giving details of reserves found.

Continue reading “ONGC discovers oil, gas in Arabian Sea blocks”

PTI – There are around 100 electric vehicle (EV) charging stations across the national capital at present and this would be the first time that some of them would have battery swapping facilities.

PTI – “Hyundai has been one of the largest manufacturers and consistent investors in Tamil Nadu. This strategic partnership is a testimony to Hyundai’s commitment to boost the socio- economic development in the state and make the country self-reliant,” Hyundai Motor India MD and CEO Unsoo Kim said in a statement.

PTI– “Report of the Energy Transition Advisory Committee (ETAC) has been received by the MoPNG. The Govt. of India is yet to accept ETAC report,” the Minstry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MoPNG) said in a tweet.

WASHINGTON, May 10 (Reuters) – The largest U.S. oil and gas trade lobby group said on Wednesday it believes sharp emissions cuts proposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) would result in the elimination of new internal combustion vehicles.

But a California air regulator said the EPA plan “will benefit the climate, air quality, environmental justice, and economic development” and a top environmental group urged the agency to ramp up the pace of adopting electric vehicles to ensure the U.S. is on a path to 100% zero emission new vehicle sales by 2035.

Continue reading “US oil lobby blasts EPA emissions cuts plan, California likes it”

TOKYO, May 11 (Reuters) – Japan’s Honda Motor Co (7267.T) on Thursday forecast a 19.1% rise in operating profit for this business year, after it missed analysts’ estimates in the fourth quarter.

Japan’s second-biggest automaker forecast full-year operating profit rising to 1.0 trillion yen ($7.40 billion) compared with a 985.62 billion yen average profit expected by 21 analysts. It said it expected higher sales volume and to benefit from a strengthening supply chain.

Continue reading “Honda sees full-year profit rising 19% after missing forecasts in Q4”

TOKYO, May 11 (Reuters) – Japan’s Nissan Motor Co (7201.T) on Thursday said it expects operating profit to rise 38% this year on a stronger outlook for sales and production volumes.

The Yokohama-based automaker sees operating profit rising to 520 billion yen ($3.85 billion) in the financial year that just started, compared to a 396.21 billion yen average profit forecast in a poll of 19 analysts by Refinitiv.

Continue reading “Nissan sees 38% full-year profit rise on stronger sales outlook”

SAN FRANCISCO, May 10 (Reuters) – Rivian Automotive Inc (RIVN.O) is betting it can keep prices high for its debut lines of electric pickup trucks and sport-utility vehicles even when competition swells, its CEO said, a bold move that may be necessary if the startup wants to make a profit.

And one some see as risky, since Rivian products will soon face more rivals at a time when market leader Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) is slashing prices to spur demand in the face of souring consumer sentiment, and traditional automakers are tightening competition with lower-priced electric vehicle (EV) models.

Continue reading “EV maker Rivian takes bold bet with higher-priced vehicles amid heating competition”

SAN FRANCISCO/TOKYO, May 10 (Reuters) – Panasonic (6752.T) said on Wednesday that it will delay the commercial production of its 4680 battery cells championed by Tesla CEO Elon Musk and begin operations during the April to September period in 2024, later than previously scheduled, as the company aims to improve their performance.

Tesla’s Japanese supplier, Panasonic, previously planned to start volume production for Tesla between April 2023 to March 2024.

Continue reading “Panasonic delays production of new Tesla battery to improve performance”

DETROIT, May 10 (Reuters) – General Motors Co (GM.N) will consolidate North American sales operations for commercial vehicles, parts and telematics services under a new brand umbrella, GM Envolve, that will compete with Ford Motor Co’s (F.N) Ford Pro unit and others for revenue from business vehicle fleets.

GM executives said the reorganization is aimed at making it easier for commercial fleet customers to negotiate electric and combustion vehicle purchases and sign up for services and software offerings that GM is developing to generate revenue after the vehicle sale.

Continue reading “GM overhauls North American commercial vehicle sales operations”

DETROIT, May 10 (Reuters) – Ford Motor Co (F.N) on Wednesday unveiled the latest addition to its muscle truck franchise – a Ranger Raptor midsize pickup with a 405-horsepower engine and a suspension designed for racing across the desert, made possible in part by Ford’s electric vehicles.

The Ranger Raptor, and the rest of the new generation of Ford Ranger pickups, will launch in North America later this year, illustrating how established automakers are shifting their combustion-vehicle lines toward more powerful, higher-profit variants as regulators clamp down on carbon emissions.

Continue reading “Ford’s new muscle truck, Ranger Raptor, made possible by EVs”

SHANGHAI, May 10 (Reuters) – BYD Co Ltd (002594.SZ), on Wednesday cut the starting price of its best-selling Seal sedan by 10%, as the Chinese electric vehicle (EV) giant seeks to extend its lead in the world’s largest auto market with lower-priced products.

The company replaced its line-up of the model with five new versions. That includes a rear-wheel drive Seal Champion Edition with a 550-km (342-mile) driving range per charge at a starting price of 189,800 yuan ($27,459). This is 20,000 yuan cheaper than a previous version with the same driving range, according to BYD’s website.

Continue reading “China’s BYD cuts starting price for Seal EV; aims to extend lead”