Follow us on social media:
Runtime: 11:00
0:00 Tesla Cuts Headcount Even More
1:08 Hyundai Adds Hybrids to India Expansion
2:05 Tough Q1 for EU Automakers
3:33 New Rule Makes Auto Braking Standard
4:44 More Van Safety Tech Would Have Big Impact
5:51 Rivian Opens Its Charging Network to Everyone
6:44 EV Charging Almost As Fast As Filling Up
7:32 NIO Semi-SSB Launches in June
8:25 Porsche Racing Series Switches to eFuel
Visit our sponsor to thank them for their support of Autoline Daily: Bridgestone, Intrepid Control Systems and Teijin Automotive.
This is Autoline Daily, the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry.
TESLA CUTS HEADCOUNT EVEN MORE
Difficulties reducing headcount and falling sales are irritating Tesla CEO Elon Musk, according to a publication called The Information. They’re referencing the EV maker’s Q1 sales, which were down 9% to under 390,000 units as well as its efforts to get rid of 10% of its global workforce. But that amounts to roughly 14,000 people or nearly the same as Rivian’s entire workforce and it’s probably taking a little longer than expected. So, now Musk is fueling more layoffs himself. On top of the 10%, two executives – one the senior director of EV charging, the other the Director of Vehicle Programs and New Product Initiatives, and most of their staff, which includes roughly 500 employees at the EV charging group, are being let go. No word on what will happen to the various projects they were working on, so we’ll have to wait and see if these layoffs have an impact on Tesla.
HYUNDAI ADDS HYBRIDS TO INDIA EXPANSION
Just a few days ago Hyundai announced a shift to focus more on hybrids in North America, including making them at its new plant in the U.S. in Georgia, which was only supposed to make EVs. But its shift to hybrids is more global than that. The Hyundai Group, including Kia, also plan to launch hybrid CUVs in India by 2026 or 2027. India, which has the largest population in the world, is quickly becoming an important market for the Group. It plans to sell nearly 900,000 vehicles in the country this year and produce 1.5 million vehicles in India by next year. And the hybrid plans come on top of its EV expansion in the country. Hyundai will mass produce its first EV in India by the end of the year and have 5 by 2030. And Kia will start EV production there next year. The Group says it’s all about being committed to a future of electrified mobility.
TOUGH Q1 FOR EUROPEAN AUTOMAKERS
It was a tough first quarter for Volkswagwen, Stellantis and Mercedes-Benz. All three reported a drop in sales and profits. At Stellantis, sales were down 10% to 1.3 million vehicles, which brought down revenue 12% to €41.7 billion. SBut it did not release any profit numbers, because Stellantis only reports full financial results at the end of each half. At the Volkswagen Group, sales came in at 2.1 million vehicles, down 2%, revenue dropped by less than 1% to €75.5 billion, but its operating profit fell by 20% to €4.6 billion. VW says that sales at Audi and Porsche were down 5%, which helps explain why operating profits fell so much. At Mercedes, sales fell 8% to 463,000 units, though sales of vans were up 7%. EVs were down 8%, but PHEVs rose 6%. Revenue fell 4.3% to €35.8 billion, and net profit plummeted 25% to just a shade over €3 billion. All three companies say they expect to do a lot better in the second half of the year, which suggests that the second quarter results may not be that good either.
NEW RULE MAKES AUTO BRAKING STANDARD
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration or NHTSA finalized a rule making automatic emergency braking technology standard on all new vehicles in the U.S. By 2029, all new light passenger vehicles must be equipped with forward collision warning, pedestrian detection braking and automatic emergency braking. Around 90% of new vehicles today are available with emergency braking under a voluntary agreement with automakers but there are no performance requirements. The new rule sets those standards. The systems must stop a vehicle with another vehicle in front of it at speeds up to 62 MPH. It also has apply the brakes automatically at speeds up to 90 MPH when a collision with a lead vehicle is imminent and up to 45 MPH when a pedestrian is detected. The systems must also work at night. NHTSA estimates that the mandate will add $82 in cost per vehicle but will save 362 lives and prevent 24,000 injuries per year.
MORE VAN SAFETY TECH WOULD HAVE BIG IMPACT
And speaking of safety, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety or IIHS is calling on automakers to offer more standard safety features for light delivery vans. Based on federal crash data from 2016 to 2021, the IIHS estimates that equipping every light van with front crash prevention, lane departure prevention, blind spot detection and intelligent speed assistance, could address 26% of all police reported crashes, 22% of injury crashes and 37% of fatal crashes involving light vans. Thanks to the growth in e-commerce, more delivery vans are on the road. About 500,000 light vans are sold in the U.S. every year.
RIVIAN OPENS ITS CHARGING NETWORK TO EVERYONE
Rivian is opening up its charging network to all EVs. Later this year it will start installing new chargers that are taller, have longer charging cables and can charge EVs with either a 400- or 800-volt architecture. At first they will feature CCS connectors, but will also be compatible with Tesla’s connector with an approved adaptor. I know both Rivian and Ford have already started making those adaptors available to customers. And Rivian says later versions of the new charger will also come with the Tesla connector, which is also known as North American Charging Standard or NACS or SAE J3400. Rivian’s network currently has about 400 DC fast chargers in North America, but it plans to grow that to 3,500 fast chargers and 10,000+ Level 2 chargers.
EV CHARGING ALMOST AS FAST AS FILLING UP
Polestar and EV battery startup StoreDot just demonstrated fast charging that’s almost as fast as filling up with gas. A Polestar 5 prototype, equipped with a 77-kWh battery pack, was able to charge from 10 to 80% in just 10 minutes, adding 200 miles of range. The charging rate of the vehicle started at 310-kW and peaked at over 370-kW. StoreDot’s fast charging battery technology features silicon-dominant cells that have an energy-density on par with NMC cells without the need for a special cooling system. It uses software to help achieve the fast charging times and the companies say the pack could be increased to at least 100-kWh.
NIO SEMI-SSB LAUNCHES IN JUNE
And in other EV battery news, Chinese automaker Nio announced its semi solid-state battery will launch in June. It’s a 150-kWh battery that has the same dimensions as all of Nio’s other batteries, so thanks to its battery swapping technology, all of its customers can use it. However, Nio is only renting the battery to customers because it’s believed to cost as much as Nio’s ET5 model. Owners with a 70/75-kWh battery can rent the new pack for $21 a day and those with a 100-kWh pack only have to pay $14. The semi solid-state battery has a range of 1,000 kilometers or 621 miles based on the Chinese test cycle and it has the highest energy density of any mass-produced battery pack in China right now.
PORSCHE RACING SERIES SWITCHES TO E-FUEL
Porsche continues to pioneer the use of synthetic or eFuels. The upcoming season of the Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup racing series will run exclusively on eFuels for the first time. The fuel, which comes from a pilot plant in Chile will allow the up to 32 cars in the field to drastically cut their CO2 emissions. This is all about keeping ICE vehicles around, not just on the race track, but all past and present gas-burning Porsches. The EU recently eased up on ICE bans by 2035 to allow vehicles that run on eFuels, so the testing and development in the Porsche racing series will be useful. The biggest hurdle currently looks like building out an infrastructure for eFuels, so prices can come down. We’ve heard it costs three times as much as higher octane fuels.
But that brings us to the end of today’s show. Thanks for making Autoline a part of your day.
Thanks to our partner for embedding Autoline Daily on its website: WardsAuto.com
“ Hey Boss, sales are down, what should we do?”
“ get rid of people in R&D, that should help for sure”
“ ummmmmmm, okay, maybe… or maybe make it worse??”
Tesla cutting their charger department seems like an odd choice. A lot of the value of TESLA is that they would be a charge point provider and thus receiving significant revenue from that network. Seems odd to get rid of that department which is such a significant part of their valuation. Are we seeing Tesla self destructing?
So more and more manufacturers are replacing ICE vehicles with EVs and sales are down ? I wonder why? maybe , because the public hasn’t drank the Kool-Aid enough to believe what their being told.
What else is dangerous or injury making about vehicles? How about doors that have sensors so they don’t close on people’s hands? Sun visors that automatically deploy so you’re not blinded when cresting a hill? Radios that have a maximum volume that always allows emergency vehicles to be heard?
All these ‘safety’ items are getting ridiculous. 43,000 people die annually in the U.S. with cars. We now want to save 300 of them by everyone spending $80 each. Give me a break.
If sales are down at Tesla, you’d think manufacturing people, not R&E people would be the ones you’d need fewer of. Also, as MERKUR said, it seems odd that they’d cut the EV Charging department. Their charger network has been the main reason to buy a Tesla over other EVs for years, and now that they’re letting non-Teslas use them, the chargers should be a major profit center for Tesla.
I think the Porsche e-fuel story is the first bit of potential sanity I’ve seen in automotive news in a while.
You know what mandatory emergency breaking will do? It will provide drivers a false sense of protection that will allow more distracted driving. I can now look at my phone longer cause if traffic is stopping my car will automatically stop. I guess thats great if it works 100% of the time. But I’d prefer people just pay attention.
Also 10 min to recharge although is a great step in the right direction I wouldn’t call that equal to a gas fill up. I believe gas station pumps are regulated to 10 gal per minute. So for a 200 mile range (all things equal) assuming 30 miles per gallon thats 6.6 gallons. or about 40 seconds. Even in a truck that only gets 18 miles a gallon you’d need to pump 11 gallons and that would only take a about 66 seconds. So yes a far cry from the hours of charge time but still not same as a gas fill up. If you think it is next time you get gas check the time and stay at the pump for 10 minutes and you’ll see how long that really is.
NHTSB estimate $82, Auto Makers cost $164, Increase to MSRP $328.
Now that Tesla has developed the charging ports and fully assembled pick-n-drop charging stations maybe the majority of R&D is done and its more about implementation than development. Cutting that department might be the right thing to do. It seems it would be more of a logistical management thing now. Picking places and getting them installed, Without a major shift in battery technology or at least charging technology I doubt they need the staff they had.
Adding $80 to the price of a car is nothing, but how well does this auto braking actually work, and does it keep working after sensors get dirty, etc.? Also, does it occasionally perform unintended actions, like slamming on the brakes causing rear end collisions? Will the system slam on the brakes if it sees a pedestrian, even if the pedestrian will be across before the car gets to them, or there’d be space to steer around them?
If agencies want to make driving safer, a good start would be to require controls and displays that are safe to use while actually driving a vehicle. Yeah, it would be difficult to come up with specifics, but some of today’s cars are awful in that regard. Tesla is the worst, but some others are none too good.
When you charge an EV you don’t stand around holding a wire or hose. You connect, make sure it’s charging then leave to shop, buy food, use the restroom etc..We generally charge while eating lunch. You get a text when it’s finished charging and you generally have 10 minutes to get back and move the car. So super fast charging will become as boring as buying gas. But at least you don’t have to hold the nozzle. Personally a 30 minute charge meets my driving break needs.
Lambo said: ” If you think it is next time you get gas check the time and stay at the pump for 10 minutes and you’ll see how long that really is.”
And that’s for only half a fill up. My Mini goes 400 miles on a tank, and the Highlander goes ~450-600, depending on the type of driving. Even the relative gas hog Porsche with a smallish tank goes more than 300, no matter what.
Yeah, a big part of Tesla’s charger work might now be finding places to put them, and arranging for the utilities to run power for them.
e-fuel will be expensive, easily 3 to 4 times the price of gas and its availability will be limited. I don’t see this as a solution for regular folk.
If local restaurants I go to had even level two charging in their parking lots, an EV would work for most of my driving. Unfortunately, no such luck, at least in my area.
Albe- This fast charging is going to put you right in the middle of should you stay there or go shop. You cant really go shopping in 10 min. and you likely wont want to just stand there. I don’t hold the handle at a gas pump either. I start the pump and will typically empty out any paper receipts in the car or clean the windshield if it needs it. But I’ve actually timed a few fill ups and it’s never been over 3 min for 400+ miles of range.
@Kit My Escalade has auto braking and no, it’s not that smart. All it’s done so far is scare the hell out of us a couple times. Example: backing out of a driveway with higher than average slope. The sensors think the approaching road is a wall and violently slams on the brakes.
My Highlander has auto braking, but so far, it hasn’t done anything scary. It can be turned off in a menu, but defaults to “on” with each restart. According to a youtube video I saw, holding the “traction control off” button for a few seconds turns the auto braking off, in addition to the traction control. As long as it doesn’t do anything bad, I’m ok with it being there.
Daily Driver- My Ram has done the same thing. For that reason I most of the time have the rear sensors turned off. Needs a bit of tuning.
If the EV revolution continues to falter, information programs like our Autoline Daily may have to go to every second day since there will be nothing to push … err report. Sorry, did I finally say that out loud.
The Tesla team building out superchargers has been doing sterling work across the world. The superchargers are known to be reliable and located in suitable places, while the network has grown in leaps and bounds. It’s been a vital part of the enterprise’s success through the years.
Here’s a non-Tesla source, zoom out until the world comes into view:
https://supercharge.info/map
Who’s still using a gasoline-powered smartphone?
My smart phone will be mostly coal powered in three weeks, when I’m in Indiana for the summer.
There are Tesla chargers in Kokomo, IN where I spend summers, a mile or two from the road from Indianapolis to South Bend. The chargers are in the lot of a Meijer store. They used to sell pizza by the slice and other lunch things, but I think they may no longer do that.
Sean, the supercharger map is interesting. As expected, a lot of chargers in the US, southern Canada, western Europe and China, but zero chargers in South America and India, and only a few in the Middle East and none in Africa, except for a few in Morocco. That could change in India, if they start building cars there.
I like the ring of chargers on the coastal road around Iceland. Still remember when the first station opened in Italy, before the Model 3 even came out.
Regardless of what Elon Musk’s rationale for kicking out a proven, successful, and effective team in toto may be, the messaging is egregious. Many people have bought Teslas because of their confidence in an ever-expanding, reliable SuperCharger network, which has also become the US standard. It’s been proceeding at a breakneck pace lately, so going slower would not raise many eyebrows.
Tesla is pouring real billions into autonomous driving this year. While the results of the recent move to a full neural network are impressive, first movers may also trip up.
About pizzas, saw something new here in Switzerland, sold at the takeout counter of a larger supermarket in the city: a Döner pizza, complete with a neon-orange zig-zag of sauce on top. Looked like it could power something bigger than me. No nuclear subs here, though.
I found some interesting statistics on just how much the US varies when it comes to Electric usage.
Nationally between 2005 and 2015 Electric heating increased from 30% to 36% and 39% of hot water heaters increased to 46%. However, take a northern state like Michigan and only 6% of homes are heated with electric. Most homes in the snowbelt use natural gas.
Take Arizona in comparison 0% use gas for heat which is why the Electric Power Sector is the largest consumer of natural gas in AZ in 2022 @ 78%. So, they use electric but the majority of that electric comes from natural gas.
I’m surprised such a low percentage of water heaters are electric. I’d think nearly all would be.
Most heating in Florida would indirectly be gas powered, as about 3/4 of the electricity is from gas.
I have gas heat in my ~90 year old house in Indiana. It was heated with coal until 1961, when gas was run to its location. A lot of people seem to use propane in nearby rural areas, where there is no natural gas.
1. Arizona does use gas for heat – My parents house in Tempe that we moved into in 1961 had a gas furnace.
2. Not auto related, however, our house in South East Michigan has oil heat. They did run a gas line down the road & all the neighbors that had propane switched to gas. That was the year that propane hit $5 per gallon.
@JWH, Isn’t gas heat cheaper than oil where you are? I’m pretty sure it is in central Indiana.
JWH- Your parents house must be the exception. The site I was looking at gave 0% which I found odd thinking it would still be at least 2-3%. But it looked like heat pumps are real popular out there and something like 37% of all US homes have a secondary supplemental heat source. So, Gas or wood fireplace, space heaters or solar.
I flipped a home that had about 120 sqft of solar panels facing south and a vent with a blower just inside that wall. On a sunny day it would help heat that room but couldnt heat the whole house. I think it was installed in the 90s and I never messed with it cause it wasn’t leaking and worked. Also built one to help heat a pool back in the 80s and that worked well.
Kit – Haven’t done a direct comparison recently – Couple of factors.
1. Oil for this winter is about $700 so not outrageous (at least in my opinion).
2. Converting to gas would require a new furnace.
3. We like oil heat.
JWH, $700/year sounds pretty good, for Michigan. I’d think an oil furnace could easily be converted to gas, but maybe not. A neighbor converted an oil furnace to gas, and my coal furnace was converted to gas. Both were many years ago, though.