AD #2507 – Tesla Props Up EV Segment, Daimler Frowns on Platooning, Ford Takes Different Path to Connectivity

On today’s show… Tesla is saving the EV segment single handedly… Daimler says it doesn’t see a business case for platooning big trucks… and Audi takes backseat entertainment to a whole new level. All that and more coming right up on Autoline Daily.

This is Autoline Daily the voice of the automotive industry.

HEAD OF INFINITI LEAVES THE COMPANY
A day after Nissan’s Chief Performance Officer, Jose Munoz, took a leave of absence, there’s more changes today with its management. The head of Infiniti, Roland Krueger who started at the position just a few years ago, announced he’s leaving Infiniti to pursue new opportunities. He’s being replaced by Christian Meunier, who had been in charge of Infiniti’s global sales and marketing.

DAIMLER INTRODUCES 1ST AUTONOMOUS SEMI
Daimler Trucks introduced the new Freightliner Cascadia semi-truck with SAE Level 2 autonomous capabilities, making it the first partially automated production truck available in North America. Its technology allows the truck to brake, accelerate and steer by itself at any speed. In addition to the new technology, the Cascadia’s fuel economy is now 35% more efficient than the original model introduced back in 2007.

DAIMLER INVESTS IN LEVEL 4 BIG TRUCKS
The company also announced it’s investing $570 million to develop an SAE Level 4 autonomous truck, which it hopes to have on roads within a decade. Daimler Trucks also said it doesn’t see a business case in the U.S. for platooning trucks in long distance applications. That technology allows two or more trucks to be electronically coupled, to help improve aerodynamics and save fuel. But it says after testing platooning for several years, the fuel savings are less than expected and drop further once a truck becomes decoupled.

HYUNDAI’S MODULAR, WALKING CONCEPT
Last week we showed you a concept from Hyundai called the Elevate. And now we have more details. It features wheels with robotic legs that allow it to drive, walk or climb over just about any type of terrain. As you can see, the legs feature a series of joints to allow it to walk like a reptile or a mammal. It’s a modular EV platform that has the capability to swap out different bodies for specific situations. Hyundai says the Elevate is part of its “Last Mile” solutions for future mobility.

Still to come… Harley announces pricing for its first electric motorcycle.

Be on the lookout for our coverage of CES this week. We’ll be interviewing automakers and suppliers about the new technology they’re showing off. Look for those reports starting later this week, and if you’re at CES look for us at the ZF booth, number 8500.

AUDI TIES VR TO VEHICLE MOVEMENTS
Speaking of CES, Audi plans to take the boredom out of riding in the back seat. It’s showing off technology that pairs virtual content with the movements of a vehicle in real time. So, for example, if the car makes a right turn, the spaceship in the video game you’re playing makes a right turn. Audi has co-founded a new start up company, called holoride to commercialize the technology, which is based on an open platform that will be available to any car company or content developer.

TESLA PROPS UP EV SEGMENT
Sales of electric cars shot up 100% last year in the U.S. market. Automakers sold 208,000 EVs. But it was all thanks to Tesla. If you take Tesla out of the tally, EV sales were down 18%. Only 46,000 non-Tesla EVs were sold. And that has got to worry automakers. They are never going to meet the mandates for zero emission vehicles if Tesla gobbles up the market.

HARLEY ANNOUNCES PRICE OF LIVEWIRE
But Harley-Davidson hopes it can do the same as Tesla and corner the electric motorcycle market. We showed you the production version of the LiveWire back in November of last year and now we know the price of the bike. It starts just under $30,000 before incentives. That incentive is 10% of the price or $2,500, whichever is less. So, $2,500 in this case, which brings the price down to a little over $27,000. That sure is a lot for a motorcycle, but it’s not even close to the most expensive model in Harley’s lineup. We also now know the LiveWire will have up to 110-miles of range and do 0-60 in 3.5-seconds.

Coming up next, Ford and Toyota get connected.

TOYOTA TO CONNECT VEHICLES IN U.S.
Toyota has announced that it’s equipping both Toyota and Lexus vehicles with 4G LTE connectivity in the U.S. The service will enable things like Wi-Fi hot spots, remote start and diagnostic capabilities and an emergency button that connects to a 24/7 response center. Toyota says that’s just the beginning. In the future it will offer more convenient and predictive experiences to its customers. The automaker has teamed up with telecommunication providers KDDI and AT&T to enable the connectivity in its vehicles, which will start in the fall of this year and run through 2024.

FORD TAKES DIFFERENT PATH TO CONNECTIVITY
But while Toyota and GM are currently placing their bets on the 3G and 4G parts of the Wi-Fi spectrum for connected vehicles in the U.S., Ford is taking a different path. It announced that all new vehicles starting in 2022 will be equipped with cellular vehicle to everything technology or C-V2X, which is being built alongside the 5G network. Dedicated Short Range Communication or DSRC has been the popular choice to this point because it’s proven and can be implemented now. C-V2X has not yet been approved by U.S. regulators, but Ford believes it’s the best solution for connected vehicles. In certain situations, C-V2X has twice the range as DSRC and is more reliable because it doesn’t always have to send data back to a cell tower before relaying information to the vehicle.

But that’s it for today, thanks for watching and please join us again tomorrow.