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GM had a full press release of their new GMC Hummer EV and are now taking pre orders. GM has also announced plans for a 100% electric Silverado in 2023. Boasting a 400 mile range on a full charge by the President of GM.
Ford will not be shutting down their facilities this year for their annual summer shutdowns. This usually comes between production of model years and is usually the time the factories are retooled and repaired. Employees can still request time off through the UAW over the summer. Ford said they were very grateful for the flexibility of their employees.
GM is restarting 1500 truck production next week at their Wentzville MO plant but will be pausing or limiting output of 6 other factories. Some of these include the Spring Hill TN plant, Lansing Delta and Lansing Grand River facilities. GM dealers current inventory on hand is down almost 50% from last year.
The head of the EPA, Michael Regan, announced that there will be new emissions regulations coming into effect in July. Although the details have not been released I expect there to be stricter standards that are in line with Biden’s climate change policies.
The new 2 trillion dollar infrastructure plan is said to include 100 billion in EV consumer rebates. The bill also had 15 billion set aside for installing half a million new EV charging stations.
Biden aides will be holding a meeting on the current automotive supply chain issues on April 12th. The meeting is said to include chipmakers and top executives from GM Ford and other auto manufacturers. The Auto industry is pushing for federal legislation to help them out of their current situation.
Toyota is selling automated driving tech in japan. This is a level 2 system meaning it can change lanes and pass cars on the highway. This is only being released in the Lexus LS and Toyota Mirai models and only in Japan but the technology was designed to be able to be utilized anywhere.
Renesas will resume production at their chip manufacturing facility in eastern japan that caught fire by April 19th. The fire took place on March 19th and original estimates said it would be June before the facility was back up and running. The rally behind Renesas to get them the support they need to reopen seems to have worked.
Nissan recently ended their stair stepped volume bonus plan for dealers. The former CEO of Nissan, Carlos Goan, seems to be credited with being the creator of this “controversial” practice. The program was changed because Nissan dealers complained the manufacturer set unrealistic monthly quarterly and annual goals. This in turn led to dealers deeply discounting vehicles which led to reduced resale values and damaged the brand’s reputation. What I find so ironic about this is that nowhere in the articles I have read about Nissan does anyone mention that a ton of other auto manufacturers do the exact same thing. In my experience this seems to be commonplace among the auto industry. Manufacturers are throwing billions of dollars out to incentivize dealerships to devalue themselves in the hopes of hitting the next bonus level and I’m not convinced that it is a great practice.
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