AD #2720 – The Story Behind the Mustang Mach-E, VW Cuts Cost of EV Production, Acura MDX Limited Hand-Built Models

This is Autoline Daily reporting on all aspects of the global automotive industry.

VW CUTS SALES GROWTH FOR 2020
As we’ve reported, the global auto industry is going through a downturn and the largest automaker in the world is feeling the effects. Volkswagen announced its cutting sales growth for next year, mostly due to weak demand in China. Previously it forecasted a 25% increase compared to 2016, now it’s cut that to 20%.

VW CUTS COST OF EV PRODUCTION
Last week, VW announced a huge $66 billion investment into EVs. And while that’s a big commitment, the company will get significant cost savings producing electric vehicles. Volkswagen CEO Herbert Diess told investors that its new ID.3 EV will be 40% cheaper to manufacture than the electric version of the Golf. The battery cells and battery system provide most of the cost savings, while about 5 to 10% comes from dedicating an entire plant to building EVs. If Volkswagen can save that much on production, it will be a big help for the company to remain profitable in its shift from combustion engine cars to electrics.

BMW REVEALS i4 DETAILS
By 2023, BMW will have 25 electrified models and it’s revealing more about one of the all-electric versions, the i4. You can get a sense of the shape of the sedan but details are still obscured by camo while it’s under testing. Powering the i4 is an electric motor that delivers roughly 390 kW or 530 horsepower and an 80-kWh battery pack. It will do 0 to 100 km/h in around 4.0 seconds and has an approximate range of 600 WLTP kilometers or 330 EPA miles. Production of the i4 starts in 2021.

AUDI NAMES NEW CEO
And speaking of German automakers, Audi has a new leader. It named former BMW executive Markus Duessmann as its next CEO starting April 1st of next year. The luxury brand has struggled since it fired former CEO Rupert Stadler last year due to the diesel emission cheating scandal. Duessmann is an engineer and the company hopes that know-how will help reinvent the brand.

UAW RATIFIES NEW FORD CONTRACT
On Friday, UAW members voted in favor of a new 4-year labor contract with Ford. The union said 56.3% of workers approved the deal. As part of it, Ford will invest more than $6 billion in its U.S. plants, create or retain 8,500 UAW jobs, pay raises and lump sum payments over the life of the contract, path to full-time employment for temps and unchanged healthcare coverage. This just leaves FCA for the UAW to bargain with, but as we’ve said it’s not as likely to go as smoothly as it did with Ford, since FCA is at the center of the UAW scandal.

VIRTUAL VEHICLE TEAR DOWN
It’s important for car companies to benchmark their competitors and on last week’s Autoline After Hours, we were joined by Mathew Vachaparampil, the President and CEO of a company called Caresoft, which is able to provide analysis of a vehicle without having to tear it down. It uses a giant CT scanner to scan a vehicle and that data is then digitized so you can see everything in the car wearing virtual reality goggles. In the following clip, John gets a tutorial of the system from Mathew. Check it out.

Mathew Vachaparampil, President and CEO, Caresoft Global
“So you can see every part, every gear, and so on… So here’s the full construction of the vehicle… of the motor. So if you click that button that gives you all the information of that part, and the way we synchronize this is most customers have a PLM system (Product Lifecycle Management System) like Teamcenter, so this integrates in very well and you’re able to have the data. The objective here is to have the same information as a competitor, and it is to understand quickly what the competition is doing so that you can learn- it’s like us going to school- we try to learn from the past and [learn] a degree and to shrink your product development lifecycle (PDL) because PDL are shrinking from 36 months to [now] 24 months and so on so this is your edge to understand the competition.”

To learn more about Caresoft and its technology, you can watch that entire show right now on our website, Autoline.tv or you can find it on our YouTube channel.

ACURA MDX GETS LIMITED HAND BUILT MODELS
Honda poured a bunch of money to build a new Performance Manufacturing Center at its plant in Marysville, Ohio, which makes the Acura NSX. With sales of that car lagging behind what was hoped, Honda has started to make limited-edition versions of its other vehicles in the PMC. The latest to get the treatment is the Acura MDX SUV. Each one is hand assembled by the same master technicians that build the NSX and only 300 will be made for the U.S. and 30 for Canada. Surprisingly, they’re not ridiculously marked up. Acura says pricing will be in the mid-$60,000 range, but a regular MDX with most of the same features would be at least $60,000.

HOW FORD DEVELOPED THE MUSTANG MACH-E
We’ve got a great background story on how Ford developed the Mustang Mach-E. At first they had no intention of making a performance electric car. Instead, they started developing a “compliance car,” that was essentially a Ford Escape stuffed with batteries. But when Jim Hackett became CEO he asked why they were developing an electric that had no hope of selling and would lose money. So he shut the program down and ordered them to tap into Ford’s iconic nameplates to come up with something people would love to buy. Jim Farley then pushed for an electric CUV that looked and drove like a Mustang.

That meant Ford had to throw out nearly 2 years of development work, yet Hackett forced them to keep the original production date. The team raced into action, using Ford’s customer-centric and cross-functional team approach. To develop a massive infotainment screen like Tesla’s they made mockups from cardboard and paper. Customer research showed that people wanted a rotary knob for volume control. To quickly test that, they took an empty Keurig coffee pod, poked a straw through the bottom and attached it to the cardboard screen with a brass fastener. Customers loved the concept, so the Mach E has a 15.5 inch screen with a big rotary knob at the bottom. It was developed in only 90 days. To develop the chassis, they used Ford’s racing simulator in North Carolina to quickly try out different setups and iterations, which saved a lot of time. Put it all together and the program went from sketch to production tooling design in only one year. These days that is blinding fast.

By the way, if you’d like to learn a lot more about the Mach-E to tune in to Autoline After Hours this Thursday. We’ll have the top engineer and designer on and we’ll take a deep dive into what this car is all about. That’s this Thursday at 3 pm eastern time on our website Autoline.tv and on our youTube channel.

MUSTANG MACH-E PERFORMANCE DETAILS
But here’s a few facts and figures to hold you over until that show. It will be offered with a standard (75.7 kWh) or extended range, 98.8 kWh battery pack and rear- or all-wheel drive. The extended-range battery pack and rear-wheel drive will return at least 300 miles of range. Performance will vary among models, but Ford says the GT is aiming for a 0-60 time under 4 seconds, while the GT with Performance Package will do it in the mid-3 second range. 

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