AD #2987 – GM & Ford Convert More Temps to Full-Time; Foxconn to Make EVs with Byton; Ford a Force for Social Good?
January 5th, 2021 at 11:45am
Listen to “AD #2987 – GM and Ford Convert More Temps to Full-Time; Foxconn to Make EVs with Byton; Ford a Force for Social Good?” on Spreaker.
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Runtime: 10:24
0:07 GM & Ford Convert More Temps to Full-Time Employees
0:46 December Sales Forecast Shows Market Still Recovering
1:13 Most Active Automotive Stocks
3:55 VW Forms New Division for Energy & Charging
5:11 Foxconn to Make EVs with Byton
6:04 Honda ‘Car Mask’ Removes Viruses from Cars
7:23 New Lidar Company Announces Solid State Lidar
7:53 Bridgestone Using Drones to Detect Rubber Tree Disease
8:39 Ford Branding Self as Social Do-Gooder
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This is Autoline Daily, the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry.
GM & FORD CONVERTING MORE TEMPS TO FULL-TIME EMPLOYEES
During contract negotiations in 2019, the UAW fought for a pathway for temporary workers to become full time employees, so they can earn better wages and benefits. And now GM and Ford are converting hundreds of temps to permanent employees this month, 650 at GM and 400 at Ford. Last year, GM converted more than 900 employees, while Ford converted nearly 600. FCA’s contract with the union doesn’t include conversion dates like with GM and Ford. Most of the temps being converted work at GM and Ford’s truck and SUV plants.
DECEMBER SALES FORECAST SHOWS SALES CONTINUE TO RECOVER
Automakers in the U.S. market will be reporting their sales later today and we’ll find out if it was a December to remember or a time to forget. Ward’s Intelligence forecasts that the SAAR will come in at 15.8 million, down from 16.8 million a year ago. But that’s up slightly from November, which shows the market continues to recover. We’ll report the final figures in tomorrow’s show.
MOST ACTIVE AUTOMOTIVE STOCKS
It was a brutal day on Wall Street for some of the new tech auto suppliers. Quantumscape, which is working on solid state batteries and counts Volkswagen as an investor, saw its stock price plummet more than 40%. We don’t know exactly why, but Bloomberg reports that certain shareholders who held restricted shares were able to sell them starting yesterday. But for Chinese EV startups it was a very good day, as sales reports out of China show good growth for electric cars. NIO, the Chinese EV startup, was the most actively traded automotive stock, with over 200 million shares trading hands. Chang’an, which is not a startup but is growing fast, was the second most active with a volume of 136 million shares. Ford, which announced it was dropping its joint venture with Mahindra in India, came in at 63 million shares, followed by Li Auto, another Chinese EV startup at 45 million. And Tesla rounded out the top 5 most active stocks with 40 million shares being bought and sold.
| Most Active Auto Stocks | |
|---|---|
| NIO | 200 Million |
| Chang’an | 136 Million |
| Ford | 63 Million |
| Li Auto | 45 Million |
| Tesla | 40 Million |
VW CREATES NEW DIVISION FOR ENERGY & CHARGING
To help support its EV offensive, Volkswagen has created a new division for energy and electric vehicle charging, called Charging & Energy. It will manage the services, equipment and infrastructure required for all of VW’s brands and will be headed up by a former executive from Germany’s top utility company. As part of its plan, the automaker will install an additional 750 charging stations, including its first high power units with up to 300 kW of power, at ten VW factories in its home market by the end of the year. That will bring its total to about 2,000 and by the end of 2025, Volkswagen wants to increase that to 4,000 points across all its brands. The automaker is also looking into autonomous charging robots. Meant for areas like underground parking, an owner would first request the service through their smartphone, a robot then goes and picks up a charging pod, which is then maneuvered close to the vehicle where the robot opens the plug door and plugs in the charging pod. When complete the robot comes back, unplugs the pods and then hauls it back so it can be charged back up.
FOXCONN TO MAKE EVs WITH BYTON
We recently reported that Apple wants to come out with an electric vehicle by 2024 and now Foxconn, the company that actually assembles the iPhone, wants to get in on the EV game too. But like more EV startups are doing, Foxconn is turning to contract manufacturing. It agreed to invest $200 million in Byton, the Chinese EV startup that launched in 2017, and will start building an electric SUV sometime next year. In October, Foxconn said it wants to provide components or services to 10% of the world’s EV somewhere between 2025 and 2027. And this partnership will be a key part of that strategy. Foxconn had previously announced a joint venture partnership to do the same thing with FCA in China, but we’ve heard nothing about it since the news dropped last year.
HONDA ‘CAR MASK’ WILL REMOVE VIRUSES FROM CARS
Honda fast-tracked a device that can remove viruses from inside of a car. The Kurumask, which is a mashup of the Japanese word for car and mask or car mask, is a thin cover that goes over an existing cabin filter. Millions of nanometer-sized barbs that stick out from the Kurumask help remove 99.8% of airborne virus droplets, including coronavirus, in about 15 minutes. It lasts for 15,000 kilometers or a little over 9,300 miles and costs about $70. It’s only available on the Honda N-Box in Japan but the company hopes to ramp up production so it can be used on more models.
On Autoline After Hours we’ll be diving into some of the biggest issues facing the auto industry. We’ll have Jeff Stout from Yanfeng and Pete Bigelow from Automotive News joining John and Gary, and we invite you to join them on our website or YouTube channel.
NEW LIDAR COMPANY ANNOUNCES SOLID STATE LIDAR
Another day, another new lidar company. This time it’s Israeli startup Opsys Tech, which introduced its next-gen solid state lidar that it says combines the advantages of flash lidar with the range and resolution of scanning lidar. It has a range of 200 meters or over 650 feet and can scan its full field of view at 1,000 frames per second. The company says the lidar is customizable for a variety of uses.
BRIDGESTONE USING DRONES TO DETECT DISEASED RUBBER TREES
Natural rubber that comes from Para rubber trees is a very important raw material used to manufacture tires and maintaining a sustainable supply chain is critically important for tire companies. That’s why Bridgestone is using drones to help detect diseased rubber trees. It features diagnostic technology that combines aerial images with artificial intelligence that can distinguish between healthy trees and ones with white root disease. The disease, which is on the rise, is hard to detect and can cause trees to rot if not treated. Bridgestone is currently testing the technology and says the trials have been able to successfully diagnose diseased trees with about 90% accuracy.
FORD BRANDING SELF AS SOCIAL DO-GOODER
Ford is doing something that no other automaker is doing. It’s branding the company as a force for social good. Last year it launched an advertising campaign called We Do Our Part, where it highlighted how the company started manufacturing ventilators, masks and even mobile testing stations to fight Covid. Later, as the country became more politically divided it launched a campaign called Built For America in which it made clear Ford is building vehicles for all Americans, no matter what their political affiliation. And it just launched a new campaign called Finish Strong, where it’s encouraging people to follow Covid prevention protocols until there’s enough vaccinations for everyone. Keep in mind that right now Ford is launching the new F-150, the Mustang Mach-E and the Bronco Sport. So it’s diverting advertising space away from those launches and directing it for corporate branding. It’s an intriguing marketing strategy but maybe it’s already paying off. You know how earlier in the show we reported that Ford was one of the most heavily traded automotive stocks with 63 million shares trading hands? Compare that to General Motors, where only 13 million shares were traded. GM has four well known car brands, but as a corporation, General Motors is practically invisible to the public.
But that’s the end of today’s show, thanks for watching.
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Comments (28)
January 5th, 2021 at 12:25 pm
@Sean on Most active automotive stocks: the number of shares says nothing. You have to look at traded value, so number of stocks times stock value.
At the end of the show you repeat this nonsense: “Ford was one of the most heavily traded automotive stocks with 63 million shares trading hands? Compare that to General Motors, where only 13 million shares were traded. GM has four well known car brands, but as a corporation, General Motors is practically invisible to the public.” The traded volume of Ford was 63 million times $8.60 = $540MM, of GM 13 million times $41.6 = $540 MM. Ford is a hot stock and GM is practically invisible to the public?
This is like your recent statement “several automotive suppliers are larger than OEMs”, which I called you out on and you never rectified. I suggest you either get educated in finance and get understand topics like this or you have somebody who understands this take care of it.
January 5th, 2021 at 12:27 pm
@1: “and start understanding topics like this or you have somebody who understands this take care of it.” instead of “and get understand topics like this or you have somebody who understands this take care of it.”
January 5th, 2021 at 12:38 pm
I see that it said the Honda car mask “removes” virus droplets but it does not say it kills them! I can’t imagine having this dirty filter in my car for 9,000 miles. IMO, this would be like keeping all your used clenex in your car, or even more clear, putting an outhouse next to the front door. I believe it much wiser just to clean the vehicle more frequent.
January 5th, 2021 at 12:47 pm
Seems like every manufacturer is getting into the charging business instead of getting together to agree on developing a single charging plug. I don’t think it makes much sense to have to carry a bunch of adapters on long trips. This is one major reason why EV’s are best used as a city car where charging is done at home.
January 5th, 2021 at 12:48 pm
I’m no stock guru but I also wondered what it means to have stock trading hands, verses an actual increase in stock price? Shuffling around means next to nothing other than its at a price where many must figure its a good buy while others feel its a good time to sell. Tells me the stock price is where it belongs.
I will say that corporate image can do wonders for a company beyond the products it produces. Its the whole idea behind name brands, Marketing 101. They may or may not be any better than the other similar products but can still fetch a premium price for a name like Gucci, Armani, Rolex, and even Apple and Tesla. Having public perception that the company is more than a car company could really help Ford but they also have a long standing history that will make that battle a tough one. Its easier for a new company like Tesla to be the beacon of social responsibility and not have any prejudgements to overcome. Not sure that many people actually decide on a car purchase from a commercial anyway so this may be a good strategy for Ford. Plus any efforts they make in helping the community around them is a good thing too.
January 5th, 2021 at 12:51 pm
@4: yes, it would be great if they would be able to get to an agreement on standard chargers. It is a common interest for all EV producers: it would help lower the availability of charging stations, one of the main barriers to entry for EVs.
January 5th, 2021 at 12:54 pm
John, nice spot on the “Advocate for the Automotive Industry”. Automotive has most always been on the forefront of the American experience and it’s nice that you applauded that (we always knew that you supported them).
I wonder what the flow-rate of that virus filter is; catching nanoparticles has got to be a very fine mesh and restrictive. One way to alleviate virus concentration (on the filter) would be to add a UV light or ozone generator to kill (them ‘critters’).
January 5th, 2021 at 1:19 pm
#6. Chuck, thanks for the feedback on our “Advocates of the Auto Industry.” No one else is publicly supporting this industry, so we will.
January 5th, 2021 at 1:30 pm
#1. Vim, almost every major financial outlet reports on the most active stocks. And they don’t weigh them with the share price. They want to show where investors are most actively trading. Same for us.
Using your logic we should not report car sales, but instead should report car sales x MSRP (which doesn’t make any sense to do).
Our report that some suppliers have a higher market capitalization than some OEMs is factually true and so there is nothing to rectify in our reporting.
January 5th, 2021 at 1:43 pm
Sorry if this posts twice it was sent an hour ago and didn’t show up.
On Ford; I will say that corporate image can do wonders for a company beyond the products it produces. Its the whole idea behind name brands, Marketing 101. They may or may not be any better than the other similar products but can still fetch a premium price for a name like Gucci, Armani, Rolex, and even Apple and Tesla. Having public perception that the company is more than a car company could really help Ford but they also have a long standing history that will make that battle a tough one. Its easier for a new company like Tesla to be the beacon of social responsibility and not have any prejudgements to overcome. Not sure that many people actually decide on a car purchase from a commercial anyway so this may be a good strategy for Ford. Plus any efforts they make in helping the community around them is a good thing too.
January 5th, 2021 at 1:53 pm
4 I thought there was already an ANSI standard for EV plugs that everyone was using besides Tesla.
January 5th, 2021 at 2:08 pm
Regular HEPA filters, like used for semiconductor clean rooms, should remove more than 99.8% of covid viruses, if what I found was correct about their size as 60-140 nm diameter. The filters would probably have more back pressure, and need more “push” from the fan than regular cabin air filters.
January 5th, 2021 at 2:09 pm
8) Level 2 chargers in the US are standardized, but I think Level 3 (Fast Chargers) vary. I believe Tesla Superchargers are only for Tesla. Perhaps the use depends upon rate of charge. I don’t really know much about them.
January 5th, 2021 at 2:27 pm
13 A guy I talked to Saturday with a Porsche Taycan had an adapter to use Tesla chargers. Maybe it was only for “destination” chargers, though. Also, I guess I don’t know if the adapter was “approved” by either Porsche or Tesla.
January 5th, 2021 at 2:38 pm
@9: TESLA was the last on your list. Traded 40 million shares * $738 = $ 29.5 billion (with a “b”). Versus $540 million for Ford (with an “m”). So investors traded 55 times more money in TESLA than in Ford.
Do you continue to think that the number of shares traded is relevant, John?
January 5th, 2021 at 2:51 pm
15 Whether it “makes sense” or not, number of shares traded is the standard published metric for most active stocks.
https://finance.yahoo.com/most-active
January 5th, 2021 at 3:23 pm
Wim’s view of traded stocks X value is more of a reflection of Market Capitalization during a specific time window. Just the number of traded shares is an easier way to evaluate what is happening in the market during a trading period.
There is nothing wrong with this way of comparing if it fits ones needs but there are better tools.
January 5th, 2021 at 3:26 pm
Perhaps better said:
Traded shares are a variable
Wim’s expression is an equation
they are not interchangable
January 5th, 2021 at 8:08 pm
I’m not sure if I need a new vehicle nor what would satisfy me, but I’m in the thinking process.
I like my MKZ for the ride and comfort. But i would like even more comfort if I were to buy another cruiser. On the other hand, my eye has been on the honda Ridgeline. It has a good ride for a truck and I could haul all the things I would want to.On the other hand, my wife inherited her dad’s new Escape with few miles, so maybe I should try an EV, like the Bolt, MustangE, ect.
The EV still sounds like a pain in the ass.
Think I’m leaning toward a larger comfort car or the Ridgeline.
Hoe about sharing your 2cents worth to help me narrow my choices.
January 5th, 2021 at 9:04 pm
19 If you want more comfort than the MKZ, that might not be easy, unless you really want to spend a lot of money, or get a big Benz a few years old. If you want a truck, but don’t really need a truck, the Ridgeline is the best one available.
If you can do your normal driving within range of charging at home, an EV shouldn’t be a pain. For luxury, Audi e-tron is probably the best. For value and performance, with bad ride, Tesla Model 3. Stodgy, but practical, Bolt. The Mach-E looks promising.
I like my Camry hybrid for a grand compromise of efficiency and reasonable comfort, but as I remember, you checked it out and didn’t like it.
January 5th, 2021 at 9:43 pm
I’m sorry Kit, but the my options really suck and makes my point! There are no comfortable sedans that are affordable.
I think we agree the Ridgeline is pretty hard to beat for most uses eventhough it costs a bit more. But that is relative.
For as much as I would like to try an EV, it is not the time
January 5th, 2021 at 10:06 pm
21 I guess comfort is all relative, and there are various aspects of comfort. Overall, I consider my Camry more comfortable than my Corvette, because it is quieter and rides better. In one way, though, the Corvette is at least as comfortable. The seats fit me very well. Actually, my 2010 Mini which I recently sold, was reasonably comfortable to me. The seats were comfortable, and the car wasn’t terribly noisy. Most interstates are smooth enough that ride quality is a nonissue for road trips.
January 6th, 2021 at 1:11 am
So Apple and Foxconn will suddenly make perfect EVs in two years? ROTFLMAO!
If this makes some ‘feel good’ about the next Tesla killer … well I’m patient and my money stays on TSLA stock.
January 6th, 2021 at 8:46 am
Foxconn seems to do a decent job of making iPhones and iPads. Yeah, they may discover that cars are different.
January 6th, 2021 at 8:54 am
23 Any of these companies that want to get into the EV car business will soon find out just how difficult it is. Not because manufacturing a EV is so difficult but the industry takes a high investment to even get started. It takes years to get from start up to where your actually selling a vehicle and you burn through tons of cash in the meantime.
I believe many of these companies look at EVs as just like any other electronic device like building a phone. They can out-source most of the commodities to get a decent suspension and interior and an EV powertrain is less complicated that an engine and transmission.
Unlike a phone or washing machine however cars have to go through governmental required testing for passenger safety. The tricky part about this is the testing is not supposed to be done with a prototype vehicle. The testing requires the car to be built as it will be sold to the customer with your production tooling. So after spending the money on the expensive dies and stampings, then you can proceed to testing. When these companies want to hand build a few cars that’s fine but when they want to sell over 60-100 cars per year they have to comply with the NHTSA and IIHS testing which requires them to destroy about 9 vehicles. If they fail a test that requires a redesign and the testing is done again destroying more vehicles until they pass. That’s just for passenger safety and I know vehicles were crashed for fuel safety too and some regulations were put in place for electrolyte spillage and other things specific to EVs. (not that familiar) But the point is getting into the car manufacturing business is tough and expensive and sure a company like Apple has deep pockets but it is nothing like launching a new phone. This is why you see so many start-ups flop.
January 6th, 2021 at 10:03 am
I call bullshit on your story FORD BRANDING SELF AS SOCIAL DO-GOODER.
Ford is a racist company, as evidenced by the fact Fords original launch date for the new Bronco coincided with O J Simpsons birthday. Simpson who many believe got away with murder and the Bronco are forever linked together.
January 6th, 2021 at 10:34 am
26 I give Ford the benefit of the doubt on the OJ’s birthday thing being unintentional, but if you go back in time, Ford certainly has had a dark past, as old Henry was a Nazi sympathizer, and had published a virulently anti-Semitic newspaper.
To me, though, none of this has much to do with today’s company, but the “social do-gooder” thing is a bit pretentious.
January 7th, 2021 at 10:54 am
John’s coverage of the OEM;s that stepped up to make ventilators and PPE’s was interesting. There was a conspicuous absence of OEM’s with foreign ownership like FCA for one example. American investors and politicians should remember this when they think about US based auto companies.