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Runtime: 8:25
0:07 FCA/Renault Merger Falling Apart
1:04 Reid Bigland Sues FCA
2:10 EV Sales Continue to Surge
2:55 Audi e-tron Off to Fast Start
3:33 Land Rover Discovery Impressions
5:40 Your Input on GM’s AVs
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This is Autoline Daily reporting on the global automotive industry.
FCA SAYS “NO DEAL!’
In a surprise development last night, FCA yanked its proposed deal to merge with Renault off the table. FCA blamed the French government for the collapse, and so did Renault. The French government wanted to delay any decision, because it wanted Nissan to vote in favor of the merger. Instead, Nissan was going to abstain. So the government wanted more time. Or at least that’s what the story is. No doubt we’re going to learn more details. There’s no question that Renault wanted the deal to go through. And no wonder it was a sweet deal for Renault. FCA sells a million more vehicles than Renault, it earns almost twice as much revenue, makes more than double the operating profit, and has a market cap almost 25% larger. Yet FCA was willing to go 50-50 on the merger. Who knows if the deal is dead, but Renault knows that a sweet deal just slipped through its fingers.
| 2018 Financial Comparison | ||
|---|---|---|
| Renault | FCA | |
| Sales | 3.8 Million | 4.8 Million |
| Revenue | €57.4 Billion | €115.4 Billion |
| Operating Profit | €2.9 Billion | €7.2 Billion |
| Market Cap | €16.6 Billion | €20.5 Billion |
FCA EXEC SUES FCA
Meanwhile there’s more news at FCA. Reid Bigland, the head of sales for FCA North America just filed a whistleblower lawsuit against the company. A couple of years ago FCA was accused of faking some of its sales reports, it was sued by one of its dealers and the U.S. Justice Department launched an investigation. The Detroit News reports that Bigland cooperated with the Feds and that FCA retaliated against him by withholding $1.8 million in compensation. In fact, FCA is reportedly using that compensation to pay fines to the Justice Department. What an ugly situation, and we’ve got to believe this is not going to end well for anybody.
EV SALES CONTINUE TO SURGE
Sales of electric cars in the U.S. market are up 68% so far this year compared to 2018, based on numbers from Wards Intelligence. But compared to April, sales in May fell by more than 12%. Most of the credit for the year-over-year increase goes to Tesla, and so does the month-over-month drop. A year ago Tesla still wasn’t at its production goal of making 5,000 Model 3s a week. So we’re still comparing sales this year to a relatively weak number from last year, which accounts for the strong percentage increase. Tesla reached its production goal last July so we’ll probably see the rate of increase in EV sales start to slow down then.
| 2019 U.S. EV Sales | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 2019 | 2018 | Change | |
| Jan – May | 87,425 | 51,893 | +68% |
| May | April | ||
| 15,240 | 17,387 | -12.3% | |
AUDI E-TRON OFF TO FAST START
In the last year we’ve seen three new EVs enter the market, the Hyundai Kona, Jaguar I-
PACE and Audi e-tron. And the e-tron is the clear winner so far, by far. Audi sold 1,109 of them, compared to 1,073 for the I-PACE and 452 for the Kona, even though the e-tron has only been on sale for two months. Last month alone it outsold the Jag nearly 4 to 1 and the Kona by 6 to 1. We should note the Audi and Jaguar are sold nationwide, while the Hyundai is only sold in ZEV states.
| 2019 U.S. EV Sales | ||
|---|---|---|
| YTD | May | |
| Audi e-tron | 1,109 | 856 |
| Jaguar I-PACE | 1,073 | 228 |
| Hyundai Kona EV | 452 | 144 |
LAND ROVER DISCOVERY IMPRESSIONS
There’s a lot of vehicles that come through the Autoline Garage and here’s Sean with one of our latest test vehicles.
(Discovery Impressions can only be viewed in the video version of today’s show.)
TELL US WHAT YOU REALLY THINK
Recently, we asked you to leave us a voice message with your opinions on whether NHTSA should allow General Motors to operate a fleet of self-driving cars without a steering wheel or pedals. Not surprisingly, we got a lot mixed responses. But first we’ll give the floor to those of you who think the regulators would be nuts to allow this…
Scott, Detroit, MI
“Nuts? Yeah probably much so. You won’t catch me in one of these vehicles. Nope.”
Aaron, Carlsbad, CA
“I think that it would be good if only they used it in a test track that was closed to the public, for development purposes only. I would not want to see one of those on the highway where the public could be at risk.”
Joshua, Vermont
“I say it is stupid to have an electric car without a steering wheel.”
Eugene, Michigan
“There always needs to be someone behind the wheel to at least take over because computers do fail. There should be a pedal or steering wheel for the driver who can take over if the car was to not function in any type of way.”
And then there’s the other side of the argument
Sanders, Los Angeles, CA
“Self-driving cars are definitely going to save thousands of lives and so we need to start making those tests to start making progress.”
Tom Bowen, Minnesota
“The market is progressing towards it and sooner or later it’s going to happen. There should be thought about how we can mitigate the risk with a safety driver but they really should let us move forward with this.”
Thanks so much for your responses and taking the time to share your feedback.
We’ve got a great Autoline After Hours coming up this afternoon. Gary Vasilash and I visited the SAE-General Motors Autodrive Challenge where in 8 universities from the US and Canada were given Chevrolet Bolt EVs and told to turn them into autonomous vehicles. It’s really all about developing a pipeline of young engineers to work on autonomous technology. I think you’ll find it a very interesting show, so tune in at 3 pm this afternoon on our website or youTube channel.
But that’s it for today, thanks for watching and please join us again tomorrow.
Thanks to our partner for embedding Autoline Daily on its website: WardsAuto.com
John McElroy is an influential thought leader in the automotive industry. He is a journalist, lecturer, commentator and entrepreneur. He created “Autoline Daily,” the first industry webcast of industry news and analysis.
