AD #2579 – Tesla Autopilot Capabilities Grow, PSA Continues to Turn Opel Around, Ford Trademarks the Name “Scout”

This is Autoline Daily reporting on the global automotive industry.

WOMEN TAKING MAJORITY OF GM BOARD
Later this year, General Motors will have a majority of women on its board of directors. GM will be only one of two S&P 500 companies that have both a female CEO and a majority of women on its board. Bloomberg reports that the only other company that can claim that is Best Buy. GM is about to have two of its male board members retire and it’s not going to replace them. That’s how it’s going to end up with a majority of women. Even so, GM is setting a standard for the rest of the auto industry to follow

TESLA’S AUTOPILOT MORE AUTO
Tesla made big news yesterday, with Elon Musk showing off the latest technology for its Autopilot system. It has a new computer, what they call the FSD, or full self-driving computer. It’s 40x more powerful than the one it replaces, and will fit into Teslas that are already on the road, if you cough up an extra $5,000. It’s impressive. You can now summon your car to come to you, get in and tell it where to go, the car will keep up with traffic, stay in its lane, automatically change lanes if the car in front is going slower or the lane is blocked, transition from one freeway to another, exit the freeway, and go park itself. Maybe that’s not really true Level 4 or 5 autonomy, but it sure is better than any other system a car company offers by a country mile.

TESLA LAUNCHING AV RIDE-HAILING SERVICE
Thanks to these capabilities, Elon Musk announced that Tesla will start its own autonomous ride-hailing service next year. It’s also going to allow Tesla owners to put their cars into that fleet so they can earn money with them. Musk says the service will instantly be cash flow positive.

TESLA ANNOUNCING Q1 RESULTS TOMORROW
All this is really impressive. But remember, on Wednesday Tesla is scheduled to report its first quarter financial results. So its seems that Tesla could be using yesterday’s announcements to soften the blow in case the numbers look really ugly.

PORSCHE EASES YOUR ENVIRONMENTAL SOUL
If you’re a Porsche owner who’s environmental soul is being ripped to shreds while you drive around in your fossil fuel burning car, the automaker has a way to help ease your guilty conscience. It’s offering a carbon offset program. Customers use a tool to roughly calculate how much emissions their car produces in a year and then they buy into environmentally friendly projects that will help offset those emissions. For example, a person that drives a 2019 Cayenne S 10,000 miles a year would pay between $67 and $152 to offset its emissions, depending on the project chosen. That’s a lot less than going out and buying an all-electric Taycan.

AS THE DIESEL TURNS
There’s more twists and turns in the Volkswagen diesel saga than a soap opera. Reuters reports that German prosecutors are investigating improper payments made to a manager linked to the diesel cheating. The manager, who is not being named, received nearly a million dollars in bonus payments despite being suspended from the company for his role in the cheating. At this point, with everything that’s happened, it would be hard for me to believe that this was something as simple as a clerical error.

We’ve got a fascinating Autoline After Hours coming up this Thursday when our special guest will be Robert Bollinger, the CEO and founder of Bollinger Motors. We’ll be talking all about his all-aluminum, all-wheel-drive, all-electric, off-road truck.

PSA CONTINUES TO TURN OPEL AROUND
PSA CEO Carlos Tavares is working miracles with Opel. The company announced it sold nearly 33,000 light commercial vehicles in the first quarter of the year, which is a 35% increase compared to a year ago. Opel credited its Movano, Vivaro and Combo vans for fueling the growth. GM sold Opel to PSA about two years ago because GM couldn’t turn a profit with the German automaker but it looks like Carlos Tavares is pushing the right buttons to resurrect Opel.

UMICORE HURT BY SLOW EV DEMAND
China’s decision to scale back subsidies for EVs is having an impact on at least one business. Umicore, a Belgian based company that supplies cathodes, lowered its 2019 earnings forecast because EV demand in China is expected to slow after the government cut subsidies. And that caused its stock to tumble 17% on the news. Cathodes help determine the performance of a battery in an electric vehicle. Umicore says cathode sales are being delayed 12 to 18 months because of China and slow demand in other key markets.

FORD TRADEMARKS THE NAME “SCOUT”
Do you remember the Scout from International Harvester? No? Do you even remember International Harvester? The remnants of that historic company are now called Navistar. Anyway, Harvester made the Scout from roughly 1960 to 1980. And now it turns out that Ford trademarked the Scout name and could use it with the upcoming Bronco or on what’s being called the baby Bronco. It’s a great name and surprising that no one else scooped it up years ago.

And that’s it for today’s report. Thanks for making Autoline Daily a part of your day.