+++ German luxury carmaker BMW Group will raise its annual production capacity to 3 million cars by 2020 and plans to build its X5 offroader in China, German media said, citing company sources familiar with the plans. BMW Group, which includes the Mini and Rolls-Royce brands, and built 2.37 million cars last year, plans to double its production capacity in China to 600,000 cars. In North America and Mexico, production capacity will be increased to 750,000 vehicles from 410,000, adding that BMW brand wants to overtake rival Mercedes-Benz, which is owned by Daimler, to reclaim the volume sales crown for premium carmakers. +++
+++ A FORD exec pushing for fewer cars? That’s right. Cities must have less cars on their streets to ease congestion and free up alternative forms of transportation, Ford’s Europe president will say at a Future of the Car conference, the Financial Times reported in a preview of the London event. “Cities are facing huge challenges: congestion, emissions and air quality to name a few. The answer to these challenges lies in collaboration with cities and city leaders”, Farley will tell attendees. That’s a love pat for the earth, perhaps, but there’s a business-minded motive, too. It seems to make sense for car manufacturers to explore the business models that could keep them relevant in urban areas where owning a car is not always convenient or desired, or among the younger generations for whom car ownership doesn’t necessarily rank as high as it did for their predecessors. Some two-thirds of the world’s population is expected to live in cities by 2050, according to United Nations projections. Ford, which has experimented with car-sharing programs in the U.K. and Germany, last year bought ride-sharing business Chariot and plans to expand the service outside of the U.S. later this year. Farley will tell the FT conference that each Chariot vehicle leads to 11 fewer cars on the street in the U.S., and as many as 25 less in China. Ford is not alone. Volkswagen, still dealing with the residual impact of its emissions scandal, is looking to launch on-demand minibus services in mostly European cities through its new Moia brand. General Motors has launched a car-sharing program called Maven in a partnership with ride-hailing service Uber, and invested $500 million in Uber rival Lyft. +++
+++ INDIA ’s most influential government think-tank has recommended lowering taxes and interest rates for loans on electric vehicles, while capping sales of conventional cars, signaling a dramatic shift in policy in one of the world’s fastest growing auto markets. A draft of the 90-page blueprint also suggests the government opens a battery plant by the end of 2018 and uses tax revenues from the sale of petrol and diesel vehicles to set up charging stations for electric vehicles. The recommendations in a draft report by Niti Aayog, the planning body headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, are aimed at electrifying all vehicles in the country by 2032 and will likely shape a new mobility policy, said government and industry sources. The report’s focus solely on electric vehicles marks a shift away from the current policy that incentivises both hybrid vehicles (which combine fossil fuel and electric power) and electric cars, and is worrying some automakers. “India’s potential to create a new mobility paradigm that is shared, electric and connected could have a significant impact domestically and globally”, said a draft version of the report, titled Transformative Mobility Solutions for India, which will be made public this week. India’s plan to leapfrog hybrid technology comes after China announced aggressive measures last year to push sales of plug-in vehicles including subsidies, research funding and rules designed to discourage fossil-fuel cars in big cities. It would also mark a radical response by India as it looks to cut its oil import bill to half by 2030 and reduce emissions as part of its commitment to the Paris climate treaty. Officials acknowledge the blueprint faces challenges. High battery costs would push up car prices and a lack of charging stations and other infrastructure means car makers, who have been consulted on the proposals ahead of publication, would hesitate to make the necessary investment in the technology. “If we accelerate electric vehicle growth it will be a disruption for the auto sector and would require investment, but if we’re not able to adapt quickly we risk being net importers of batteries”, said a government source involved in the plans. “There has been resistance from car makers”. India’s top-selling carmaker Maruti Suzuki has invested in so-called mild-hybrid technology, which makes less use of electric power than full hybrids, while Toyota sells its luxury hybrid Camry sedan in the country. Mahindra is the only manufacturer of electric vehicles in India. India, in 2015, launched a scheme called Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of Hybrid and Electric Vehicles under which it offered incentives for clean fuel technology cars to boost their sales to up to 7 million vehicles by 2020. Despite incentives as high as 140,000 rupees ($2,175) on some cars the scheme has made little progress, with the sales of electric and hybrid cars making up only a fraction of the 3 million passenger vehicles sold in India in 2016. The scheme, which expired on March 31, has now been extended by 6 months while future policy is worked out, 2 government officials said. Lack of clarity on policy risks delaying investment in the auto sector, one official added. The new Niti Aayog report, co-produced with U.S. consultancy Rocky Mountain Institute, outlines a 15-year plan, broken into three phases starting in 2017. “Limit registration of conventional vehicles through public lotteries and complement that with preferential registration for electric vehicles, similar to that in China”, the report said, in one of its most radical proposals. To kick-start the shift, the report suggests bulk procurement of electric vehicles, building standardized, swappable batteries for two- and three-wheelers to bring down their cost and having favorable tariff structures for charging cars. “Prioritize battery and charging infrastructure development”, the report states, while setting a 2018 goal for setting up a 250 megawatt per hour battery plant with an aim to reach one gigawatt of production by 2020. It also recommends setting up battery swapping stations by 2018, common manufacturing facilities for components and increasing subsidies on all battery electric vehicles to bring them to cost parity with conventional models by 2025. Other suggestions in the blueprint include incentivising the use of electric cars as taxis by lowering taxes, interest rates on loans for purchases and electricity tariffs for fleet operators, and lowering duties on makers of such fleet cars. Puneet Gupta, South Asia manager at consultant IHS Markit, said the government would need to lead the change with generous incentives to achieve its goal. “This is one of the most radical changes the government is talking about”, said Gupta. “All cars being electric is a distant dream”. +++
+++ Sales of new imported cars, trucks and buses in JAPAN , including products made abroad by Japanese automakers, rose 1.3% percent in April from a year earlier to 19,151 units, an industry body said. Sales of foreign-brand vehicles increased 3.2% to 16,591 units in the reporting month, while those of Japanese-brand vehicles fell 9.4% to 2,560 units, according to the Japan Automobile Importers Association. By brand, Mercedes-Benz continued to rank top with 3,595 units, up 1.1%, for a market share of 18.77%. BMW came in second with 2,708 units, gaining 2.9%, for a 14.14 percent share, followed by Volkswagen, which sold 2,410 units, up 2.7%, for a share of 12.58%. Among Japanese brands, Nissan’s sales fell 4.4% to 829 units, while those of Toyota went up 1.8% to 1,184 vehicles. Toyota’s newly launched C-HR grabbed the top spot in monthly domestic sales, with 13,168 units sold. The model has become a hit SUV, with its cumulative sales in Japan over four and a half months since its launch in December 2016 surpassing 50,000 units. Honda’s N-Box mini-vehicle, which retained the top-seller position for 4 straight months through March, ranked second, with sales of 12,265 units. Daihatsu’s Move minivehicle came third with 12,004 units. 5 of the top 10 sellers were mini-vehicles with engine displacement of up to 660cc. All of the 5 were wagon-type models. +++
+++ From the man that brought us the supercar marque NOBLE comes a hardcore track machine that would give a McLaren P1 a scare. Yes, Lee Noble is back with a new speed machine. It’s called the Exile, and it’s going to be “bloody quick”, he told. The Exile is the first of a new line of vehicles under the Specialized Sporting Vehicles name. With a focus on lap times and track performance, the mid-engine coupe comes with a 3.5-liter twin-turbocharged V-6 sourced from Ford. It’s the same engine used in the F-150 Raptor, by the way. Without stating a final horsepower figure as development isn’t complete, Noble revealed the Exile will produce 522 horsepower per metric ton. Doing a quick conversion to some Yankee-friendly units reveals a figure of about 3.8 hp per pound. With those figures, Noble is aiming for a 0-60 time between 2.4 and 2.9 seconds, with a top speed of 300 km/h. Although Noble bills the Exile as a track weapon, it’s being developed to be street legal as well. The body is mostly carbon fiber but fiberglass panels are also used to keep costs down. The internal structure is mostly aluminum and Noble says it’s flexible enough to be used for other models. In fact, Noble is planning a second mid-engine sports car based off the structure. That car is currently being thought out, and Noble is unsure if it will be more road-friendly or even more focused on track performance. Specialized Sporting Vehicles is a much smaller scale operation than the Noble supercar marque, which is hardly a large operation itself. Noble says he plans on producing only 15 to 20 cars per year for Specialized Sporting Vehicles. That should be achievable if he can manage to get the Exile on the market close to its estimate price tag of $116,325. +++
+++ Fans of the manual gearbox, rejoice! PORSCHE seems keen on ensuring driving pleasure remains a core competency. GT development boss, Andreas Preuninger, nearly confirmed the next 718 Cayman GT4 will not employ turbocharging as the standard 718 Boxster and 718 Cayman do. Instead, it’s almost certain the GT4 will be powered by a naturally aspirated flat-6 engine. Not only that, but it may even wear the coveted RS badge, reserved for Porsche’s most hardcore models. Oh, and Preuninger nearly confirmed it will still offer a manual transmission. Porsche gets us. “Natural aspiration is one of our main selling propositions”, Preuninger said. “We offer a car for people who want to feel something special, who want to have as much emotion as possible, as much throttle response and immediacy from a sports-car engine. And at Motorsport we think that can be achieved a little bit better with a naturally aspirated high-revving engine than any kind of turbo”. It’s not the first time Porsche has alluded to the naturally aspirated flat-6 engine finding a home in more enthusiast offerings, while the regular cars move to turbocharged 4-cylinder engines. Porsche engineer August Achleitner, who is in charge of the 718 and 911, also hinted a naturally aspirated flat-6 would be found in cars “like the GT4 for example”. The original report speculates the 4.0-liter flat-6 engine from the 911 GT3 may be tapped, though it would likely not produce 500 horsepower as it does in its current application. Expanding on the decision to offer a manual transmission, Preuninger said that Porsche felt it wasn’t the brand’s place to tell customers what transmission makes a driver’s car, standing by the decision to stick with the stick shift. “That’s the aim, to always have the choice. Now we’ve started with that strategy in the GT3 and it pays off. I think it’s the right thing to do, who are we to tell people what’s best for them? Depending what you want to do with the car it can be perfectly understandable to go for a manual if you’re not chasing times on the track. Giving the choice is definitely our intention for the future”. However, for those not acclimated to the three-pedal lifestyle, the next GT4 may offer a PDK dual-clutch automatic. If Preuninger’s statements pan out, the next 718 Cayman GT4 is poised to be a real blessing. +++
+++ Apple getting in the automotive business, and this time we’re treated to the old rumor of the Cupertino giant tapping into the Elon Musk well of entrepreneurship by acquiring TESLA . I’ve heard this from fans, specialists and more: Tesla and Apple should be as one, instead of swapping employees or potentially becoming competitors in the near future. Apple has been rumored to be joining the automotive party in full (not just with CarPlay) for quite some time now, mostly thanks to the very secretive ‘Project Titan’. Apple has now started official tests of autonomous vehicles in California and even has its own energy division, though according to the latest reports instead of rivaling Tesla they would most likely go out on a limb and buy it all. And Apple has the means to do it: since they are sitting on a pile of cash, $250 billion in free cash to be more precise. According to the latest report though, Tesla is not the only company in Apple’s view; other takeover targets are Netflix, Hulu, Electronic Arts, Activision Blizzard, Take Two Interactive Software, and Walt Disney. “Since one of the new administration’s top priorities is to allow US companies to repatriate overseas cash at a lower tax rate, Apple may have a more acute need to put this cash to use”, comments Jim Suva, an analyst for Citigroup. President Donald Trump’s new proposed taxation plan would see the current 35-percent repatriation tax lowered to just 10 percent and companies would try to take advantage while it lasts. +++
+++ TOYOTA said its annual net profit fell for the first time in 5 years, with the Japanese automaker unexpectedly warning of more declines as a stronger yen takes a bite out of its bottom line. The Corolla and Prius hybrid maker posted a profit of 1.83 trillion yen on slightly lower revenue of 27.6 trillion yen for the recently ended year to March; well down from a record 2.31 trillion yen net profit the previous year. Toyota, which lost its crown last year to Volkswagen as the world’s top-selling automaker, expects a net profit of 1.5 trillion yen in the current year to March 2018; way off market expectations around 1.9 trillion yen. Vehicle sales in the past fiscal year ticked up to 10.25 million units from 10.19 million vehicles a year earlier. Unit sales in the key North American market remained flat, while Toyota registered a pick up in Europe, Japan and the rest of Asia. Demand dropped in Central and South America, Africa and the Middle East, it said. Japanese exporters, including major automakers like Toyota and Nissan, have benefited in recent years from a sharp drop in the yen. A weaker yen boosts the bottom line by making their products relatively less expensive overseas, while inflating the value of profits earned abroad. But this past fiscal year has seen sharp moves in the currency, with the Japanese unit surging after Britain’s shock vote to exit the European Union boosted demand for the yen as a safe haven currency. The trend briefly reversed course after billionaire Donald Trump’s November U.S. presidential election win fanned expectations that his big-spending, tax-cutting agenda would fire up inflation and push the Federal Reserve to hike interest rates. A rate hike tends to lift the dollar against other currencies. +++