Automotive Ventures Weekly Intel Report | Jan 8 2024
Intel Report: Mobility News
BY AUTOMOTIVE VENTURES | JAN 8 2024 | VIEW ONLINE
Steve caught up with Mark Hollmer at Automotive News to discuss retail technology predictions for 2024. | Link
What We're Reading:
The U.S. auto industry rebounded in 2023 with many automakers reporting double-digit sales gains. Industrywide sales of new cars in the U.S. reached 15.5 million vehicles in 2023, a 12.4% increase from the prior year. | The Wall Street Journal ($)
The severe shortages in automotive chips caused by the onset of the Covid pandemic in 2020 have continued to reverberate. Those shortages helped elevate chip-industry revenue over the past three years, as automakers and their top suppliers sought to build up inventory to avoid being caught flat-footed by the absence of crucial components. But that was never going to last forever. | The Wall Street Journal ($)
Look for discounting on EVs to continue in the first half of 2024 as automakers adjust production and consumers respond, or don’t, to price cuts and the availability of the $7,500 federal tax credit available at point-of-sale as a down payment starting Jan. 1st. | Wards Auto
High sticker prices, steep financing rates and range anxiety will fuel a slowdown in U.S. electric car adoption this year. | Bloomberg ($)
General Motors had a goal of producing 150,000 electric vehicles last year. The company ended up selling just 75,000 EVs in 2023, missing their target by 50%. | Bloomberg ($)
In the U.S., gasoline-powered, internal-combustion engine (ICE) cars were involved in about 1,530 fires per every 100,000 sold. On the other hand, pure electric vehicles (meaning those powered only by batteries) were involved in just 25 fires per 100,000 sold. | IEEE Spectrum
Excluding Chinese companies from Western EV handouts is something politicians on both sides of the Atlantic can agree on. The risk is that the West cuts off its nose to spite its face. | The Wall Street Journal ($)
China’s BYD is poised to surpass Tesla as the new worldwide leader in fully electric vehicle sales. When it does — likely in the fourth quarter — it will be both a symbolic turning point for the EV market and further confirmation of China’s growing clout in the global automotive industry. | Automotive News ($)
Tesla delivered more vehicles than expected in the fourth quarter, though not enough for the company to stay ahead of China’s BYD in global electric-car sales. | Bloomberg ($)
Tesla has lowered the range estimates across several Model Y, S, and X vehicles in the US, reducing the figure on certain trims by up to six percent. The move comes after the DOJ opened a probe into inflated claims, but Tesla doesn’t give a reason. | The Verge
Great article from Michael Dunne on the strategic advantages BYD has over competing legacy automakers. | Dunne Insights
BYD has the best return on equity among major automakers worldwide. By owning its own battery supply chain and focusing on cheaper, less zippy cells that use abundant iron and phosphate instead of scarce cobalt and nickel, it’s managed to lift margins even as material costs rose. Return on invested capital, a metric that encompasses how successful the company is at generating profits from its asset base, is also the best among volume automakers worldwide and has risen consistently for the past 18 months to overtake Tesla. | Bloomberg ($)
Elon Musk, the world’s wealthiest person, has used LSD, cocaine, ecstasy and psychedelic mushrooms, often at private parties around the world, where attendees sign nondisclosure agreements or give up their phones to enter. Some executives and board members of his companies fear his drug use could have major consequences not just for his health, but also the six companies and billions in assets he oversees. | The Wall Street Journal ($)
EV maker VinFast opened its first franchised dealership in the U.S. with Leith Automotive Group as part of the Vietnamese automaker's plans to add third-party retailers alongside its company-owned stores in California. The Leith VinFast store in Cary, N.C., is about 20 miles away from the automaker's future assembly plant in the state, expected to start production in 2025, according to VinFast. VinFast expects to have 125 franchised dealers as part of an initial rollout and then hundreds by the end of 2024 throughout the U.S. | Automotive News ($)
VinFast Vietnam’s first electric automaker, announced the signing of agreements with its five dealers in four US states: Leith VinFast (Raleigh, North Carolina), Smith Haven VinFast (St. James, New York), Principle VinFast Grapevine (Grapevine, Texas), Hiley VinFast of Fort Worth (Fort Worth, Texas), and VinFast Wichita (Wichita, Kansas). All customers purchasing or leasing VinFast electric vehicles will benefit from a 10-year or 200,000 km warranty for the vehicle and a 10-year unlimited mileage warranty for the battery. VinFast plans to expand its distribution network for its electric vehicles to 125 sale points across the US. | Vietnam News
EV manufacturer Fisker will add dealerships alongside its direct-to-customer distribution model to expand its sales and delivery network. Lucid Motors, Rivian and Fisker have followed an online and direct-to-consumer model that was started by Tesla, in their efforts to cut out middlemen. | Reuters
France aims to democratize access to electric vehicles with a “social leasing” program that allows low-income drivers to lease electric cars for as low as €40 (about $43) per month. That includes no down payment and free charging, in some cases, for six months. Eligible drivers don’t have to pay a down payment, which is subsidized by the government. | Electrek
A mainstay of cargo transport will be phased out at ports as California bans new registrations of carbon-fuel trucks in favor of nonpolluting ones. | The New York Times ($)
West Virginia has launched a "digital clearinghouse" that allows businesses not based in the state to transfer vehicle titles into a West Virginia title in their names. It marks a milestone in West Virginia, which has worked the last two years to technologically advance its systems for title, registration and lien processing. The digitization of those has allowed the state to reduce title turnaround times to as little as one day from 45. | Automotive News ($)
Nearly three-quarters of Americans say personal auto insurance is becoming unaffordable for the average person or family. Car insurance rates hit a four-decade high in October 2023. Insurance premiums were up 19% during the year, on average. As a result of the dramatic increases, 22% of U.S. drivers bought less coverage than they wanted as a way to save money during 2023. | Property Casualty 360
The New York Metropolitan Transport Authority (MTA) is enabling public buses with the ability to monitor and issue parking tickets to vehicles blocking dedicated bus lanes. | The New York Times ($)
The United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin, is aiming to take on Elon Musk’s SpaceX and ferry satellites and cargo for the likes of the Pentagon, NASA and even Amazon. | Bloomberg ($)
Five moon landers made by U.S. companies are due to touch down on the moon in 2024 with NASA - National Aeronautics and Space Administration devices on board. The first is expected to be launched early Monday, with an expected uncrewed landing next month. If that flight—or one blasting off in February—is successful, the U.S. would be back on the lunar surface for the first time since 1972. | The Wall Street Journal ($)
In April, the California Air Resources Board approved a regulation that would require railroads to replace diesel-electric locomotives with zero-emission (ZE) locomotives. Railroads normally don’t switch locomotives when they cross state lines, so California’s mandate would, by implication, cover trains nationwide. | EE Times
Europe is experiencing a rail renaissance, being driven by strong interest from passengers. Amid concerns about climate change, demand for rail service is strong, and both governments and private investors are trying to keep up. Across the European Union, passenger rail transport saw a 50 percent jump between 2021 and 2022, landing at nearly 245 billion miles traveled — just five percent shy of 2019 levels. | The New York Times ($)
McKinsey finds that in some regions, where pooling deliveries isn’t practical, drones are already considered the most cost-effective delivery mode. Drone technology may be particularly suitable for various last-mile consumer use cases, such as convenience products, prepared foods, and medical samples for labs. | McKinsey & Company
Electric bicycle ridership grew to never-before-seen levels in 2023. But despite the increased ridership, or perhaps even because of it, last year saw an increase in the number of limits and bans placed on electric bicycles and e-scooters. Here’s a look back at some of the most infamous bans and what led to them. | Electrek
Parched conditions have crippled the Panama Canal, a waterway that handles $270 billion a year in global trade. And there are no easy solutions. The Panama Canal Authority is weighing potential fixes that include an artificial lake to pump water into the canal and cloud seeding to boost rainfall, but both options would take years to implement, if they’re even feasible. | Bloomberg ($)
Global Fishing Watch, a Google-backed nonprofit focused on monitoring maritime industries, shines a light on “dark fleets,” a term often referring to the large segment of maritime vessels that do not broadcast their locations. As much as 75 percent of all industrial fishing vessels “are hidden from public view." | Popular Science
Have a great week,
Steve Greenfield
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Notable & New
In this week's "Future of Automotive" segment on CBT News, Steve discusses the outlook for automotive technology investments in 2024. | CBT News ($)
Great interview with Danny Zaslavsky from VINCUE, one of Automotive Ventures' portfolio companies. | Auto Remarketing
The International Policy Digest publishes Steve's perspective on the state of the mobility segment, leading up to the Autonomous e-Mobility Forum in Qatar in May 2024. | International Policy Digest
Steve will be your MC at the new Auto Tech Investments conference at NADA this year: Friday, Dec 2nd. | Auto Tech Investments
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