Good morning! It’s Monday, May 6, 2024, and this is The Morning Shift, your daily roundup of the top automotive headlines from around the world, in one place. Here are the important stories you need to know.
1st Gear: Musk: Extra Range Will Cost Ya To Unlock
Tesla CEO Elon Musk posted on his social media site X that the Standard Range rear-wheel drive Model Y the automaker now offers is actually capable of a lot more range than the 260 miles they were sold with... if you’re willing to pay for it. Musk posted that that pending “regulatory approval” buyers could access another 40-60 miles of range (depending on which battery they have) for “$1,500 to $2,000.” From The Verge:
Tesla replaced the Standard Range Model Y with a 320-mile range version for $2,000 more. The car now starts at $44,990, or about $37,490 if you qualify for the $7,500 federal EV tax credit.
This isn’t the first time Tesla has software-locked its cars’ range. The company revealed back in 2016 that the 70kWh battery in the Model S 70 actually had 75kWh of capacity that customers could pay more than $3,000 to access. It’s possible that the current Model S and X cars, which weigh the same as their longer-range counterparts, have also been software-limited.
The auto industry, in general, has been trending toward controlling access to cars’ existing features with pay-to-remove software locks. Polestar started selling a $1,200 over-the-air update to boost the Polestar 2’s performance in 2022. Mercedes-Benz charged the same amount, but annually, to improve the horsepower and torque of the EQE and EQS. BMW once paywalled software-locked CarPlay and, later, heated seats (the company later dropped that plan). And of course, Tesla has proven itself willing to remotely disable paid-for features when one of its cars is resold.
This the CEO’s post, complete with a shitty meme.
I don’t know, man. I really do not love automakers nerfing their cars from the factory so you can pay them a little bit more money to get features. I know it is the way of the world, but damn. I don’t vibe with it.
2nd Gear: Lucid’s Q1 Looks Like A Bummer
Lucid is facing continued concerns over its cash burn problem and the fact the electric vehicle market as a whole is softening ahead of its first-quarter earnings report. The California-based electric vehicle maker is expected to update investors on its plans to launch the Gravity crossover, its second vehicle line, to help grow the startup.
Back in February, Lucid reported a fourth-quarter net loss of $654 million. That’s not good. It’s also super not good if you look at 2023 as a whole. Lucid reported a net loss of $2.8 billion, nearly double its 2022 net loss of $1.3 billion. I know it has pretty much unlimited money from Saudi Arabia, but damn. From Automotive News:
In the first quarter, Lucid reported production of 1,728 Airs and deliveries of 1,967. While sales mark a 40 percent increase compared with the first quarter of 2023, Lucid’s production is running behind its forecast for 9,000 vehicles for calendar year 2024. Lucid also boosted sales incentives in the first quarter through discounts, lease deals and special financing offers.
The company’s stock price is down sharply this year as investors see a cooling market for battery-electric vehicles and growing consumer interest in gasoline-electric hybrids.
[...]
Investor questions submitted for consideration on Lucid’s first-quarter earnings call ask when the EV maker might reach profitability and whether a mass-market vehicle is in the works. “Are there plans for an affordable electric vehicle from Lucid?” asks one question submitted this week. “If so, what’s the roadmap for it?”
The Air large sedan starts at $71,400 with shipping and Lucid has said the three-row Gravity will start around $80,000 before shipping. The company says it’s developing less expensive luxury vehicles.
Some of the other questions submitted for the earnings call cover everything from Lucid making hybrid vehicles to turning the Gravity into a pickup truck. Having been to Lucid’s HQ in Northern California, I do not think either of those things are happening.
3rd Gear: VP Harris To Announce $100 Million For EV Transition
The Biden administration is giving away $100 million for small and medium-sized auto parts suppliers and manufacturers to upgrade their facilities and train their workforce for the transition to electric vehicles. Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to make the announcement in Detroit sometime today. From The Detroit News:
The funds are the latest in a series of recent investments and initiatives meant to spur a transition to electric vehicles.
That transition has become a key political issue in Michigan, the longtime heart of the U.S. auto industry and a crucial swing state in the 2024 presidential election. The Biden administration, knowing that, has made several similar announcements aimed at Michigan recently and is deploying top surrogates alongside Harris for the announcement.
Of the new funds, the Energy Department’s Automotive Conversion Grant program will receive $50 million to help small and medium-size suppliers convert from manufacturing parts for internal combustion engine vehicles to manufacturing parts for the EV supply chain.
The program, according to the White House, aims to “keep good, good-paying and union jobs in the same communities as automakers and auto suppliers transition to electric vehicle manufacturing here in America.”
The Energy Department’s Industrial Assessments Center Implementation Grants Program will get the other $50 million to help auto suppliers “improve their facilities’ energy and material efficiency, cybersecurity, or productivity, or reduce the greenhouse gas emissions,” the White House said.
This big ol’ chunk of change is coming from the Inflation Reduction Act and the Bipartisan Infrasture Law.
Harris is also expected to announce new efforts from the Small Business Administration to facilitate private investments into the EV supply chain and expand the lines of credit available to small businesses through the SBA.
“These actions build on the Biden-Harris Administration’s ongoing commitment to ensuring that the workers and businesses that built the auto industry remain community anchors for generations to come,” the White House said.
The vice president will be joined by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Department of Energy Secretary and former Gov. Jennifer Granholm, Acting Secretary of Labor Julie Su and Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Steven Horsford, D-Nev.
Democratic U.S. Rep. Shri Thanedar of Detroit and Michigan Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist II will attend as well.
EVs are going to be a big part of the upcoming presidential election. President Biden and former President Trump have taken up, shockingly, opposite opinions of what the transition to electric vehicles means to workers and the U.S. as a whole.
Lest we forget, electric vehicles are woke.
4th Gear: UAW Ratifies Labor Deal With Daimler Truck
United Auto Workers members voted to ratify a new labor contract with Daimler Truck over the weekend. The new contract includes at least a 25 percent general wage bump over the four-year deal. The vote shook out to 94.5 percent of folks in favor of the new contract that covers over 7,300 hourly UAW workers after a tentative agreement was reached at the end of April, averting a strike at the last minute. From Reuters:
The contract covers hourly workers at six facilities in southern states where unionization has traditionally been low, including four factories in North Carolina and parts warehouses in Georgia and Tennessee.
The deal with the German truck maker, which was spun off from what is now automaker Mercedes, comes just about two weeks before votes on whether to join the UAW will be tallied at a Mercedes assembly plant in Alabama.
The deal also includes profit-sharing and cost-of-living adjustments for workers at the maker of Freightliner and Western Star trucks and Thomas Built buses as well as the end of wage tiers that paid those building buses less than those building heavy trucks.
UAW President Shawn Fain said the pay hike matched what workers at the Detroit Three received in talks last fall.
Workers will receive an immediate 10% pay raise, followed by 3% increases six months and 12 months later, Fain said.
The lowest paid workers at Daimler’s Thomas Built bus unit will receive raises of more than $8 an hour and some skilled trades workers at there will get more than $17 an hour, Fain said.
This is just the latest installment of the UAW’s recent winning streak. First, it secured deals with the Big Three automakers last fall. Then it clinched a historic victory for Volkswagen workers at the automaker’s Chattanooga, Tennessee plant. Coming up on May 13, workers at a Mercedes-Benz factory in Vance, Alabama and a nearby battery plant in Woodstock are going to vote on whether or not to join the union.