The Renault Zoe is the champion of electric vehicles, Volvo’s transition to electrification is coming, the son of cars Ghosn used cryptocurrencies to help escape Ghosn and other disruptions with car production in Mexico. All this and more in The Morning Shift on July 24, 2020.
Thanks to this week’s report, all eyes were on Tesla, as Bloomberg broadcasts, Renault also announced exciting effects this week: the Renault Zoe is a power plant.
Yes, Tesla is obviously a high-level brand, but numbers don’t lie; The Renault Zoe is, and has long been, the best-selling electric vehicle in Europe. This week’s effects show how far the car goes from dealer batches. From Bloomberg:
The Zoe walking for 3 years [after the launch of the Frankfurt Motor Show in 2009]. Some reboots and redesigns have slowly raised their profile among consumers. Then, during the following year, anything clicked. With nearly 38,000 games sold in Europe in the first six months of 2020, the four-door sedan surpassed Tesla’s Model 3, Volkswagen AG Electric Golf and Nissan Motor Co blade.
“It’s essentially the same car that’s been around for a long time,” with some innovations in terms of reach, generation and design, said Felipe Muñoz, an analyst at the Jato Dynamics research company. “So the new good fortune is a little surprising.”
The story goes on to mention incentives as a key role in Zoe’s good fortune (you may have recently read that in Germany, others hire Zoes for free, because the hiring charge is completely covered through government incentives). Again, from Bloomberg:
It is not so unexpected to consider the incentives now available for car buyers who need to be transferred to electricity in France and Germany. The French government is providing up to 7,000 euros for the purchase of an electric car, and a scrap cash program can charge another 5,000 euros in subsidies. Germany provides incentives of up to 9,000 euros consistent with the vehicle.
It is a sedan of approximately 30,000 euros with a 52 kWh battery that allows up to 245 miles of battery life. It looks great and convenient, and with decent diversity and subsidized costs through strong incentives, I get the appeal.
Energized by
Electric cars are estimated to expand and manufacture (largely due to battery prices), so it believes they would offer car manufacturers less profit margin compared to, for example, an old diesel car that uses parts of the powertrain that have been around for decades. Clearly, there is some fact in this, however, probably due, in part, to government incentives to reduce prices for consumers, it turns out that Swedish carmaker Volvo is not struggling too hard as it is moving more towards electrification.
According to an Article by Automotive News about Volvo’s plug-in hybrid sales, they are going pretty well and putting Volvo online to fulfill their purpose of promoting 20% of electrified cars this year. Here’s what CEO Hakan Samuelsson said about the company’s profitability as Volvo moves from diesel engines to electrification:
Samuelsson added that Volvo’s profitability had not suffered, as it moved away from a heavy reliance on diesel engines, which accounted for about 45% of Volvo’s European sales in the early part of the year, with almost 60% in it last year.
“Proceeds [from the sale of plug-in hybrids] have covered the accumulation in the loading of fabrics from transfer to electrification,” Samuelsson said. “In the long run, what would be bad for your profitability is selling those old cars.”
As we communicated about Volvo and electrification, let’s look at what Robin Page, Volvo’s senior vice president of design, told Auto Express about Volvo’s future. From Auto Express:
Speaking exclusively to Auto Express, Volvo’s senior vice president of design Robin Page told us that, in combination with the electrification company, Volvo’s long-term model line will be very different from what we see today.
[…]
Page said electric cars and SUVs “contradict each other,” so the company seeks answers to long-term models that will allow consumers the models they need, SUVs, with the power generation needed to achieve CO2 goals.
[…]
“What is the global look like when other people need this superior position and all the usability of an SUV, in balance with the fact that they need autonomy? Clean aerodynamics”.
The most modern EV SUVs come from Volvo.
But the perfect things. We previously reported this week an article in the Financial Times on how Volvo turns out to think the timing of this year will be pretty decent, in terms of sales. But despite this, Automotive News reports, the company is recovering from its sales target of 800,000 cars. It may take place in 2021, but not in 2020. According to the news site:
“There will be a year behind schedule,” CEO Hakan Samuelsson said. “Before the pandemic, we were on our way to get there or get very close.”
Volvo also failed to set a world sales record in 2020, as it will not surpass 705,452 cars sold in 2019, its seventh consecutive year of record volumes.
“In the first part of the year, we lost 21%, or only 71,000 cars,” Samuelsson told Automotive News Europe. “So even if we have what we expect for the moment part of the year, which is a return to the volume of sales we saw last year, the year as a total will be lower than in 2019.”
Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn fled Japan after being arrested for monetary offenses, and theft is not exactly conventional. Allegedly referring to a music business, a former member of the U.S. Army Special Forces named Michael Taylor and a lot of money, Reuters reported earlier this month that Ghosn had transferred the budget to a company run by Michael’s sons:
Tuesday’s filing at Massachusetts Federal Court transfers $540,000 and $322,500 from a bank account in Paris last October to announce Fox LLC, a company run by Peter Taylor and a brother.
The record does not say how much the Taylors were paid, but prosecutors said it reflected “additional evidence” that they had the resources to flee and remain detained as “risk of flight.”
We are now informed that it might not be just Michael Taylor who cared about his children. Carlos Ghosn’s son emphasized more cryptocurrencies for The Taylors Company, with Reuters writing:
Federal prosecutors said Wednesday that the bills were made to Peter Taylor after he and his father, U.S. Army Special Forces veteran Michael Taylor, helped Ghosn flee to a box and a personal plane to face monetary charges.
Payments in cryptocurrency, or virtual currency, from Ghosn’s son, Anthony Ghosn, exceeded the $862,500 that Ghosn himself stressed to a corporate run through Peter Taylor in October, two months before his escape on December 29, 2019, prosecutors said.
It’s a great father-son job for those two parents.
Today, automakers that make cars in Mexico (several companies) face all kinds of disruptions as the coronavirus continues to wreak havoc in the southern U.S. neighbor.
Earlier this month, the President of the Ford Group for the Americas and International Markets, Kumar Galhotra, told Automotive News: “Due to COVID-19, the State of Chihuahua in Mexico has limited worker participation to 50%, a region in which we have several suppliers. With our plants in the United States running 100%, it’s not sustainable.” The same media also wrote this week about Volvo’s source chain issues.
And then Ford faced disorders of the source chain as a result of a rail blockade, as we saw yesterday. From Reuters:
In recent days, members of the Yaqui Aboriginal network protesting greater land rights have blocked railways used to ship car parts, such as grains and steel, from Sonora to the United States.
“The blockade of the rail network in the municipality of Guaymas, Sonora, has affected the operations of our Hermosillo plant,” Ford said in a statement sent by email.
Clearly, the car structure in Mexico struggles for several automakers. And now Volkssalaryn, in addition to facing coronavirus-like restrictions, will have to manage union wage negotiations at the Volkssalaryn plant in Puebla, Mexico. From Reuters:
After postponing operations in Mexico for more than 3 months to involve the pandemic, the automaker faces a contract negotiation in which its unions in Puebla are not easy: a 12% pay increase.
Workers can approve a strike from August 18 if their demands are met, the union told local media.
The plant, which for Automotive News employs more than 11,000 people, builds the VW Tarek, Tiguan, Golf and Jetta.
On the Alfa Romeo website:
June 24, 1910. In Milan, a new company founded under the so-called A.L.F.A. (Anonima Lombarda Fabbrica Automobili). A few years later, Neapolitan businessman Nicola Romeo took over the company and replaced his call to Alfa Romeo.
From the 24 hp, the first style, to the green Quadrifoglio badge. From the legendary Tazio Nuvolari and Enzo Ferrari, to the legend of Nino Farina and Juan Manuel Fangio. From winning the first world motorsport championship with the P2, to winning the first Formula One championship with the Alfetta 158. From Giulietta to Spider, from the Giulia dynasty to the Type 33 project. Rediscover with FCA Heritage the achievements, cars and others that contributed to the myth of Alfa Romeo.
We don’t have them in the U.S., but do you need more cars like this? We have the Leaf and Bolt, but do you aspire to less expensive EV options?
Gallery: Tesla’s story can be traced through many milestones. Here are the 25 most sensitive moments that have shaped the electric car manufacturer in 16 years. (Business Environment)
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