Auto File: 'Too much work on my plate'

CreateAl Holdings

14/11/2022 16:00

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       Nov 14 - Joe White
Global Autos Correspondent
Greetings from the Motor City!
Over the weekend, I had to do some planning for the year-end
holidays. Like the objects in your rear view mirror, they are
closer than they appear. Where does the time go?
Elon Musk says he has “too much work on my plate”. In this one
way, Elon Musk can speak for everybody. 
Today, we’ll catch up with the Tesla/Twitter/SpaceX CEO, warm up
by the cash bonfire in the electric vehicle industry and look at
some good news on the semiconductor shortage.
Elon Musk’s workload on trial
    Tesla’s board of directors and their governance of Elon Musk
will be at center stage of a trial scheduled to start today in a
Delaware court. The same judge who oversaw the litigation over
Musk’s effort to back out of buying Twitter will hear a Tesla
shareholder’s case against Musk’s unusual $56 billion pay deal
with Tesla’s directors.
If the trial goes ahead as planned, Tesla-watchers could get
their most detailed look yet into how Tesla’s directors manage
the relationship with Musk, and how the world’s richest man
juggles his duties as CEO of Tesla, SpaceX and now Twitter.
Musk himself stoked the discussion about whether he is
overloaded as he manages the upheaval at Twitter.
Musk told a conference in Indonesia that he is working “from
morning til night.”  He also tweeted that he would be sleeping
at Twitter headquarters “until org is fixed.”
Responding to a follower concerned about the impact on Tesla,
Musk replied: ”I have Tesla covered too.”
    Tesla has its own troubles.  Police in China are
investigating a fatal crash involving a Tesla Model Y. 
The EV Industry’s Cost Crisis 
    High production costs are slamming electric vehicle
startups, and turning the usual economics of mass production
upside down. 
Ramping up an assembly line is supposed to drive down the cost
of each vehicle that rolls off the end. But several electric
vehicle startups, including Lucid, Rivian and Arrival reported
per vehicle costs well in excess of average selling prices. 
Securing the cash to build longer runways is now top priority
for EV startups.
    Faraday Future said Monday it has a deal with Yorkville
Advisors Global to raise up to $350 million to bolster its
dwindling cash reserves. 
    Yorkville has previously ridden to the rescue of EV startups
Canoo and Lordstown Motors.
Indonesia’s new $2 billion EV fund
    Indonesia has established a new $2 billion fund to develop
an electric vehicle value chain with Chinese battery power CATL
and a unit of China Merchants Bank.
Renault CEO’s Turnaround Manifesto
Renault CEO Luca de Meo tipped his hat to former boss Sergio
Marchionne in a Linkedin post explaining his turnaround plan for
the French automaker.
The title, “Confessions of an Innovation Junkie,” echoes the
title of the late Fiat Chrysler CEO’s “Confessions of a Capital
Junkie” treatise on what it would take to cure the auto
industry’s “value destroying addiction to capital.”
One eye-catching element of the Renault CEO’s strategy is under
the heading “Power.” De Meo writes “combustion and hybrid
engines still have to reach their sales peak, and if we look at
it from a cradle-to-grave perspective, going all-electric is not
that obvious.”
VW’s South African combustion production hub
    Volkswagen’s South African operations could become a hub for
production of combustion vehicles for less affluent nations that
will move more slowly to electrification, the new managing
director of VW South Africa said. 
Cummins-Tata hydrogen venture
U.S. heavy engine maker Cummins and Indian vehicle conglomerate
Tata said they plan to collaborate on development of
hydrogen-fueled engines. 
Mercedes workers push for a bigger slice
Mercedes workers in Germany should get fatter profit sharing
checks, a German union leader told Reuters. Mercedes currently
caps profit sharing for German workers at 6,450 euros. The union
wants the cap eliminated.
Good news - sort of - about semiconductors     
The damage done to vehicle production by semiconductor shortages
will be far less in 2022 than the year before, according to
fresh data from AutoForecast Solutions. 
With six weeks left before most auto plants go quiet for the
year-end holidays, automakers are on track to lose about 4.3
million vehicles due to semiconductor shortages. That’s a big
hit, but not compared to the 10.5 million vehicles AFS reckons
were slashed from global production in 2021.
Automakers could benefit in 2023 as chip manufacturers make up
for a slowdown in sales of tech gadgets by shifting more of
their capacity to fulfilling automotive demand, AFS analyst Sam
Fiorani wrote in a weekly email.
Essential Reading
    What’s wrong at robo-truck company TuSimple -Breakingviews
  
    The IMF’s gloomy outlook for the world’s economy
  
    New small cars come with better protection against SUVs
  
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GRAPHIC -The Semiconductor Crisis Eases    https://graphics.reuters.com/AUTO-SEMICONDUCTOR/byvrljoyove/
 
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 (Editing by Alexander Smith)