Industry

Larry Dominique is not one to get distracted — not even by a once-in-a-century pandemic and a potentially career-disrupting corporate merger. The 36-year auto industry veteran is focused on a single mission — orchestrating the return to the U.S. by France’s PSA Group with the Peugeot brand after nearly three decades. The owner of Peugeot,

The 2021 NADA Show must go on — but it may be time to declare it virtual only. As the coronavirus continues to spread, National Automobile Dealers Association leaders are weighing whether they can safely gather Jan. 21-24 in New Orleans. It isn’t looking good. In recent weeks, more in-person industry events have been canceled

ATLANTA — Fred Schwab, a Detroiter who helped steer Porsche out of the pits of the early 1990’s recession, died July 9 following a brief battle with cancer. He was 81. Schwab was CEO of Porsche Cars North America for more than a decade. He engineered a management overhaul, in part by hiring former Toyota

DETROIT — Buick is positioning its newest vehicle, the 2020 Encore GX, to overtake its top-selling U.S. nameplate, the Encore. Over the past year, Buick has eliminated the upper trim levels of the Encore, which is now down to only the base model. Buick says reducing the number of trims helped increase sales last year,

DETROIT — Jim Farley’s gambit at the outset of the Great Recession to leave a flourishing career at Toyota Motor Corp. to help save a foundering Ford Motor Co. has paid off: In less than eight weeks, he’ll become CEO. While Ford is nowhere near the precarious position it was in when Farley moved from

Jeep is in a transformative period. While the spotlight is on the adventure brand’s upcoming off-road joust with the Ford Bronco, another larger development is taking place: Jeep is setting itself up to gain ground everywhere else. By the end of 2021, Jeep will have a varied powertrain portfolio that plays in the electrified and

The location of Tesla Inc.’s next U.S. assembly plant ultimately was decided by asking employees one question: Where do you want to live? “I went around the room with my team and said, ‘Where do you want to spend time? Where would you potentially move?’ ” CEO Elon Musk told Automotive News. “Austin was their top

German prosecutors have filed fraud charges against three former board members and a retired senior employee at carmaker Audi. It is the latest legal development in the “dieselgate” scandal, in which companies and executives were alleged to have broken emissions rules. Audi is part of Volkswagen, which in 2015 admitted cheating emissions tests on 11

Automotive News‘ annual deep dive into the industry’s vehicle plans over the next few years, the Future Product Pipeline series, shows an accelerating trend: the culling of car models and variants from automakers’ U.S. lineups as brands simplify their offerings in a bid to improve efficiency while attempting to satiate consumers’ myriad tastes. In recent

New UK car registrations went up in July for the first time this year, according to the motor industry. Figures from the Society for Motor Manufacturers and Traders are expected to show an 11% rise compared with the same month in 2019. The last time there was an increase was in December last year. It

If dealerships haven’t adopted a digital retailing process today, they will be at a disadvantage, some dealers say — and not just during a potential second coronavirus wave. The benefits of accelerated digital retailing during the pandemic extend beyond insulating dealerships from the potential of renewed state restrictions on in-person vehicle sales to slow the

German carmaker Audi has apologised for an ad showing a little girl eating a banana in front of a high-performance car, which drew a torrent of criticism on Twitter. “We hear you and let’s get this straight: We care for children,” Audi tweeted in its apology. “We sincerely apologize for this insensitive image and ensure

In the middle of the Mojave Desert, between Southern California and Las Vegas, lies the future of electric vehicle charging. An EVgo station in Baker, Calif., promises a refueling experience that’s about as close to a gas station for EVs as currently possible. In fact, no EV on the market can handle all the power

Japan’s big three automakers are dropping models and refreshing their lineups as the marketplace shifts to more crossovers and greater electrification looms. Among the disappearing models: Honda’s Fit and Civic coupe, the Toyota Yaris and possibly Nissan’s once segment-leading Versa. But a new generation of products is in the wings. Nissan will introduce its second

Tesla CEO Elon Musk says the company conducted “zero” consumer research when designing its upcoming Cybertruck. He says he doesn’t pay attention to competitors or know anything about other electric vehicles on the market. And criticism that the Autopilot name is misleading for Tesla’s driver-assist system, which has been linked to a number of accidents?

Tesla Inc. CEO Elon Musk last spoke to Automotive News in January 2015, when he joined Publisher Jason Stein on the World Congress stage. Since then, Musk has slogged through “production hell,” run afoul of stock regulators by tweeting he had secured funding to take Tesla private and seen the value of his electric car

Many Chevrolet and GMC vehicles are getting bigger and more high-tech. This year, General Motors’ two biggest U.S. brands will begin selling redesigned versions of their large SUVs built in Arlington, Texas. The SUVs are some of GM’s most lucrative and resilient products, with the Chevy Suburban beginning its 12th generation. In 2021, GM plans

The number of cars built in the UK over the past six months has slumped to the lowest since 1954, according to the industry’s trade body. A total of 381,357 cars were made the six months to June, down 42% on the period last year, said the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT). The

Car dealer Pendragon has said it will cut 1,800 jobs and shut 15 of its dealerships. The firm, based in Annesley, Nottinghamshire, runs the Evans Halshaw and Stratstone brands. It said a review had begun before coronavirus but the pandemic had made the trading situation more difficult. About 400 of the jobs cut will be

A lot of people have been having fun with “Stellantis,” the made-up name for the combination of PSA and Fiat Chrysler. Sure, it sounds like a name for a pharmaceutical product. And it’s officially supposed to evoke the stars, like “stellar.” But I suspect that the creators of this name were thinking about another bright

Nissan’s shares have plunged by 10% in Tokyo trading after warning that it would see a record annual loss. Japan’s second largest carmaker said it expects a $4.5bn (£3.5bn) operating loss this year as the coronavirus hinders its turnaround efforts. The worse-than-expected forecast came as the company predicted its sales will be the lowest in

Dealer grosses this month reached their highest levels since 2007, according to J.D. Power, thanks to a number of COVID-19-related variables working in unison to give franchised auto dealers their strongest pricing power since before the Great Recession. While growing per-vehicle profits on their signature product might seem cause for at least quiet celebration, how

President Xi Jinping is widely seen as China’s most powerful leader since Deng Xiaoping and Mao Zedong. That has also made him one of the most influential people in the global auto industry — a man whose policies roil the world’s biggest market and whose vision of transportation shapes what automakers and suppliers from Detroit

Pent-up demand from coronavirus lockdowns has brought car and truck buyers back to the market, but once there, they may see little wiggle room on price. With limited inventory, dealers are often taking top dollar for the vehicles they do have. For several weeks, the average industry gross, or the gross profit dealers get on

Inconsistency has always been a hallmark of Tesla, whether in manufacturing, or quality control, or the messaging from CEO Elon Musk. But as the coronavirus pandemic wreaks havoc with most rivals’ finances, Tesla has shown uncharacteristic stability where it matters most — the bottom line — by posting its first-ever streak of four consecutive quarterly

In the early peak of the pandemic, public transit agencies across the country saw sharp declines in ridership, as did ride-sharing and bike-sharing companies. But of these forms of personal mobility, micromobility — including bikes and scooters — is most likely to bounce back, according to an analysis from McKinsey. Despite COVID-19 disruptions to the

When Congress and the Trump administration quickly cobbled together the massive $600 billion Paycheck Protection Program, they may have created a very rare thing: a bipartisan federal program that largely worked as intended. More than 16,000 new-vehicle dealerships across the nation — including a few dozen in U.S. territories such as Puerto Rico and Guam

Authorities in Germany, Italy and Switzerland have raided the offices of car giant Fiat-Chrysler and truck maker CNH Industrial over claims some engines produced illegal levels of emissions. The action concerns alleged use of so-called “defeat devices” to mask vehicles’ diesel pollution output. Engines used by Fiat, Alfa Romeo and Jeep, as well as CNH’s

The push to bring back the Bronco started inside Ford Motor Co. only a few years after the iconic SUV went out of production in 1996. The initial effort consisted of a group of Ford employees calling themselves the Bronco Underground. Led by Moray Callum, who is now Ford’s chief designer, the group developed a

Electric car maker Tesla has shrugged off the economic upheaval caused by the pandemic to report its fourth quarterly profit in a row. The California company earned $104m (£82m) in the three months to 30 June, with the growth setting it on course for inclusion in the S&P 500. That means Tesla’s shares, already surging,