A look at 5 common car parts set for makeovers in the EV era

Much is made of vehicle parts that will be lost in the transition to EVs. But even many of the components that remain could be in for big changes.

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Mitsubishi to U.S. employees: Work from home forever

Mitsubishi Motors North America will allow most of its 300 U.S. employees to work from home indefinitely.

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Face-to-face roadside help available to BMW drivers

BMW partners with software company Blitzz to provide video chat-enabled roadside assistance.

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German auto industry braces for Russian gas disruption as Ukraine war continues

The possibility that Russia could halt the flow of gas into Germany as a tactic in its war with Ukraine has made automakers and suppliers hyper-aware of their operating vulnerability.

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Colorado car dealer group opens EV, hybrid outlet and sees sales boost

Phil Long Dealerships in May 2021 opened the Phil Long EV Outlet in Colorado Springs, Colo., a used-vehicle store that sells only hybrid and electric vehicles.

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Why Honda, Acura dealer showrooms may shrink

American Honda executive Dave Gardner says the company is considering ways to make its retailer business more efficient, including leaner inventory and smaller showrooms.

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EV outlet charges group's used-vehicle sales

Phil Long Dealerships in May 2021 opened the Phil Long EV Outlet in Colorado Springs, Colo., a used-vehicle store that sells only hybrid and electric vehicles.

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Germans brace for a Russian gas disruption

The possibility that Russia could halt the flow of gas into Germany as a tactic in its war with Ukraine has made automakers and suppliers hyper-aware of their operating vulnerability.

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Acura prices new Integra just below $32,000

The return of Acura's iconic Integra comes with a price to compete with German rivals — with two years of pre-paid scheduled maintenance thrown in to boot.

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Carvana stock plunge signals concerns over inflation, higher interest costs

The online used-car retailer struggled this week to raise $3.3 billion in the corporate debt market, having to revamp a junk-bond offering.

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Musk unloads $4 billion worth of Tesla stock

Elon Musk sold about $4 billion worth of Tesla just days after reaching a $44 billion deal to buy Twitter Inc. He has now disposed of more than $20 billion worth of the stock.

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Plastic Omnium agrees to acquire units of lighting supplier Varroc for $634 million

The supplier will buy Varroc's European and North American lighting units, and create a separate lighting business unit to complement its exterior parts business.

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Acura prices new Integra just below $32k

The return of Acura's iconic Integra comes with a price to compete with German rivals — with two years of pre-paid scheduled maintenance thrown in to boot.

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Asbury raises 2025 revenue target to $32B, up from $20B

Asbury Automotive Group now seeks to produce $32 billion in revenue in 2025 — including $6.2 billion from buying more companies.

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Porsche introducing limited-edition 911

Porsche is planning to build 1,250 copies of the 911 Sport Classic, paying homage to the 1970s-era 911 Carrera RS 2.7.

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U.S. prosecutors ask judge in Bob Brockman tax case to disregard defense filing about cognitive decline

Brockman's latest claim of deteriorating health "is a naked attempt to improperly interject unadmitted, unverified, and unsworn evidence into the record," prosecutors wrote.

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Ford's $3.1 billion Q1 net loss tied to Rivian stock plunge; execs affirm full-year outlook

Ford was profitable before accounting for its Rivian shares losing more than half their value during the quarter; the company's adjusted pretax earnings still fell 41 percent.

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Carvana gets $1.6 billion junk bond offer from Apollo to help finance Adesa deal

Carvana raised nearly $3.3 billion through the junk bond sale, which will finance its acquisition of Adesa Inc.’s U.S. car-auction business and improvements across 56 of its sites.

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Senate Democrats urge U.S. transportation chief to develop autonomous vehicle rules

"We lag behind in shaping a regulatory framework that will foster this innovation while simultaneously protecting and encouraging all of the important benefits we believe autonomous vehicles are capable of delivering," wrote the senators.

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Carvana ramps up $3.3 billion junk bond to find buyers

The new financing package could add more than $225 million of annual interest expense, roughly doubling what it paid over the previous 12 months, according to Bloomberg Intelligence.

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McLaren names Leiters, Ferrari's former tech chief, CEO

Michael Leiters takes on the role amid reports of a potential acquisition of McLaren by Audi.

 

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Nissan delays Z car launch

The Nissan Z car, a 400-hp, twin-turbo symbol of the struggling Japanese automaker's revival, is the latest product launch to be derailed by global supply chain woes.

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U.S. saw record number of automotive recall campaigns in 2021, but fewer vehicles affected

Individual car and light-truck recall campaigns reached a record high of 406 in 2021 compared with 317 in 2020, while the total number of vehicles affected dropped to 21.6 million from 28.9 million over the same period, according to data from investment bank and advisory firm Stout.

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GM Q1 earnings: Net income down 2.7% to $2.9 billion as revenue rises 11%

CEO Mary Barra reaffirmed the company's 2022 adjusted earnings guidance of $13 billion to $15 billion.

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Tesla shares plunge 12%, hemorrhage $126 billion in market value in single session

Tesla's market capitalization was already down nearly $250 billion since April 4, when Musk disclosed that he increased his Twitter stake.

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Ford CEO: New plant in Tenn. to build 'another truck' that's not F-150 Lightning

Ford CEO Jim Farley said the automaker will build an additional electric pickup at its upcoming Blue Oval City campus in Tennessee, not a next-generation F-150 Lightning.

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Ford launches Lightning F-150 EV production

Ford aims to build 150,000 Lightning trucks a year at the new part of its historic Rouge manufacturing complex while it builds a much larger electric vehicle production complex in Tennessee.

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Ford poised to launch Lightning F-150 EV production today

Ford aims to build 150,000 Lightning trucks a year at the new part of its historic Rouge manufacturing complex while it builds a much larger electric vehicle production complex in Tennessee.

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GM asks suppliers to sign carbon neutrality pledge

The pledge also calls for social and governance commitments, such as human rights protections and fair operating practices.

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Rivian pushes ahead with production despite supply chain problems

Rivian is ramping up production of its R1T pickup, R1S SUV and EDV electric delivery vans for Amazon but is being held back by parts shortages.

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Offer accepted: Elon Musk taking Twitter private in $44 billion deal

Discussions over the deal, which last week appeared uncertain, accelerated over the weekend after the Tesla CEO wooed Twitter shareholders with financing details of his offer.

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Tesla CEO Elon Musk is ready to plunge into robotaxis

The EV maker is defying industry trends with record sales despite supply chain issues, and it is now turning to a longtime passion of CEO Elon Musk: automated driving.

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Carvana rivals rethink ADESA

Carvana-ADESA deal has automakers rethinking auction plans

Carvana's pending acquisition of ADESA U.S. has prompted some automakers and dealers to rethink or sever their relationship with the No. 2 U.S. auction house.

Carvana's pending acquisition of ADESA U.S. has prompted some automakers and dealers to rethink or sever their relationship with the No. 2 U.S. auction house.

Carvana's pending acquisition of ADESA U.S. has prompted some automakers and dealers to rethink or sever their relationship with the No. 2 U.S. auction house to avoid doing business with the used-vehicle retailer that's become a fast-rising competitor.

Carvana CEO Ernie Garcia last week acknowledged that a "small handful of both buyers and sellers" have opted — at least in the short term — to not do business with ADESA in light of the deal.

Lithia CEO Bryan DeBoer, during last week's first-quarter earnings call, said he believes seven manufacturers recently have pulled vehicles from ADESA. Automotive News confirmed that Toyota Fin- ancial Services chose to end its relationship with ADESA effective April 1, a spokesman said.

"The four ADESA auction sites we used were moved to Manheim," spokesman Vincent Bray, who said Toyota Financial routinely evaluates its auction footprint, wrote in an email. "Prior to the change, we informed our Toyota, Lexus and Mazda dealer partners of the transition."

Volkswagen had not reached a final decision on ADESA, a company spokesman told Automotive News. GM Financial was assessing its physical auction options to decide on its next steps, a spokeswoman said in an email, without saying whether the company had stopped or would stop using ADESA.

Garcia said Carvana has seen less movement away from ADESA than it was anticipating. It hasn't reached a level concerning to Carvana, he said, and the company remains excited about the acquisition, which it expects to close in May.

"We don't think that that's actually flowing through and impacting the results in a way that is noticeable as of yet," Garcia told analysts and investors during Carvana's first-quarter earnings call last week.

A spokeswoman for ADESA parent KAR Global declined to discuss any automakers' departures. A Manheim spokeswoman would not comment on whether that company had seen an influx of customers as a result, citing a policy of not discussing client relationships or speculating about competitors.

The majority of Hyundai's auction activity already goes through Manheim and a few of the bigger independent houses, a Hyundai spokesman said.

"Overall, it is too early to tell how dealer attendance and participation will change at ADESA locations due to the Carvana purchase," Michael Stewart, Hyundai Motor America's senior group manager of product public relations, said in an email.

Michael Baker, a senior retail analyst with D.A. Davidson Cos., said he expects that some dealers who prefer to use physical auctions will seek alternatives to Carvana-owned sites.

"In the past, ADESA was a service that they used," Baker said. "Now, ADESA is owned by their competitor."

The deal would give Carvana ownership of 56 ADESA sites across the U.S., totaling about 6.5 million square feet of buildings on more than 4,000 acres.

Carvana, which has 17 reconditioning and inspection centers nationwide, has said it wants ADESA's real estate in order to boost its capacity and put the company within reach of more consumers.

Adding the ADESA sites would nearly double the volume of vehicles Carvana can process to as many as 2 million vehicles a year, the company said. It expects to have annualized capacity of about 1.4 million vehicles by the end of 2022.

Carvana, which last week reported a first-quarter net loss of $506 million, said it expects to mostly finance the ADESA purchase through about $2.2 billion in unsecured notes.

The company also revealed plans to raise $1 billion in preferred stock and $1 billion in common stock. Carvana CFO Mark Jenkins told analysts and investors the additional $2 billion would be used to fund improvements to the ADESA sites and for "general corporate purposes."

Automakers and dealers leaving ADESA likely would be a setback for Carvana, but some analysts said the reconditioning capabilities it's gaining might outweigh those losses.

Getting Carvana closer to more would-be customers could reduce delivery costs per vehicle, Stephens Inc. analyst Daniel Imbro said.

"Once they make their investments, that is the real benefit, I think, of why they looked at this asset," Imbro told Automotive News.

Acquiring ADESA ultimately could aid Carvana in the long run as it hopes — but there's a long way to get to that point, said Baker, the D.A. Davidson analyst. Converting the 56 ADESA sites into reconditioning centers will take time and effort, he said.

"There's a lot of reconditioning, if you will, that they need to do ... to get them ready, to get them to where they need them to be," Baker said.

Still, he said, purchasing and improving the ADESA sites may be faster than Carvana continuing to build all of its own reconditioning centers from the ground up.

Larry P. Vellequette and Carly Schaffner contributed to this report.

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Lexus is ready to sell a million EVs — but how to build them?

Entering the EV era will require Lexus to not only engineer all-electric cars but reengineer the production process that builds them.

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Lincoln resets with new design, experiences for the EV age

Ford's luxury arm is looking to differentiate itself as it enters the EV era later than many of its rivals.

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Alfa Romeo Tonale on awareness tour

The Italian brand wants consumers to have a hands-on experience with its first electrified entry ahead of the Tonale's U.S. release in early 2023.

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The latest numbers on the microchip shortage: Production loss tops 1.5 million

Another 87,500 vehicles were removed from automakers’ production schedules as the total number of vehicles cut because of the microchip crisis this year topped 1.5 million.

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Top 100 list shows shift in focus to used cars

The shifting reliance on used vehicle sales in 2021 was seen up and down the Automotive News annual list.

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Car dealers got creative and efficient in face of low stock, NADA says

As new-vehicle inventory levels plunged last year, car dealers diversified how they source used vehicles and worked to improve salesperson productivity.

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Honda: 800,000 EVs built in North America by 2030

EV production should account for about 40 to 50 percent of Honda's total output in North America in 2030, or around 800,000 battery-electric vehicles.

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BMW may look to Mexico for some X-relief

BMW is considering whether to take some of its high-demand crossover manufacturing to its roomy Mexico plant.

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Shift, job tweaks benefit staff, customers

Delray Buick-GMC in Florida reduced the length of sales shifts and changed how leads are handled, contributing to better employee retention, sales gains and increased customer satisfaction.

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DOE wants to know: How can EVs give back to 'the grid'

Ford, GM and Lucid have joined a collaboration led by the U.S. Department of Energy that wants to know how electric vehicles might boost the nation's future energy grid.

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Texas sues Vroom for alleged title delays, vehicle misrepresentation

Texas attorney general's office said Vroom allegedly misrepresented and didn't tell customers about holdups in transferring vehicle titles and obtaining registrations.

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Canada expands eligibility for ZEV sales incentives, but max rebate remains $5,000

Some pricier cars and bigger zero-emissions pickups and SUVs — retailing for as much as $70,000 — will soon be eligible for a rebate under Canada's expanded incentive program for zero-emission vehicles.

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Lexus TX will give dealers the 3-row they've been wanting

Lexus' U.S. lineup will expand in 2024 with the addition of the TX, a larger three-row crossover slotted above the Lexus RX L to appeal to American consumers.

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Startup develops a way to know the identity of every part

Alitheon's technology creates for products what fingerprints are for people— a one-of-a-kind identifier.

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Renault could explore Nissan stake sale to help fund EV shift

Selling part of its 43 percent stake in Nissan could raise billions and ease long-standing tensions between the alliance partners.

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Mazda to slot famed rotary engine in plug-in MX-30

The rollout makes good on a promise to resurrect the blade-twirling power plant after retiring the technology with the discontinued RX-8 in 2012.

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Renault eyes possible IPO for separating its EV business

Renault has been pushing ahead with plans to split its EV and combustion engine businesses as it seeks to catch up with rivals such as Tesla and VW Group.

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