AD #2861 – Hertz Forced to Stop Selling Worthless Stock; 4-Cyl Supra $8K Cheaper; Ford’s New Hands-Free Cruise Control

This is Autoline Daily, the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry.

TESLA SECURES COBALT SUPPLY
EV battery makers are working on how they can get rid of cobalt in the cathode of batteries for two reasons. First, cobalt mainly comes from the Republic of Congo in Africa, a war torn country where child labor is used in a lot of mining. Second, cobalt is expensive, and taking cobalt out of batteries is one of the fastest ways to bring costs down. But, cobalt also makes batteries more efficient and that may explain why Tesla just signed a long term contract with Glencore, the world’s largest supplier of cobalt. Bloomberg reports it could involve 6,000 tons of cobalt. BMW is also buying cobalt directly from Glencore, and the mining company also supplies battery makers such as CATL, Samsung and SK.

SEC TELLS HERTZ TO STOP SELLING WORTHLESS STOCK
As we’ve been reporting, Hertz, the rental car company, is in deep financial trouble. It was in trouble before the Covid pandemic, but the collapse in business travel was the coup de grace and it had to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. But here’s where the story gets interesting. In a desperate move to raise cash, the bankruptcy court allowed Hertz to sell up to $1 billion worth of stock as long as it warned investors they will probably get wiped out. And yet that did not stop investors. Trading volume in the stock is the highest it’s been in more than five years. Talk about irrational exuberance. Five years ago Hertz was trading at $70 a share. This February it was at $20. And today it’s trading at $2. And so yesterday the Securities and Exchange Commission decided enough is enough and it told Hertz to stop selling shares.

TOYOTA PARTNERS FOR MARINE FUEL CELL
Elon Musk calls fuel cells, fool cells. But there is a growing drumbeat of news about them. Japanese engine company Yanmar, is partnering with Toyota to develop a hydrogen fuel cell for boats. It will be based on the same fuel cells used in the Toyota Mirai. If you saw last week’s Autoline After Hours with Trevor Milton from Nikola, he said that fuel cells are better suited for long haul transportation like semis and ships.

VW STARTS SHIPPING CARS ON LNG-POWERED BOAT
And speaking of automakers and boats, Volkswagen is now shipping cars in a freighter powered by liquified natural gas or LNG. The ship, which made its maiden voyage earlier this week, is transporting cars from Germany to the Gulf of Mexico, for customers in North and Central America. It has 13 decks and can hold up to 4,800 vehicles, and it reduces CO2 emissions by up to 25%. Another LNG powered ship will go into service for the company later this year. And it’s pretty unusual to see two of the biggest automakers in the world getting involved in clean ships.

Be sure to join us for Autoline After Hours later this afternoon when the auto analyst Jeff Schuster from LMC Automotive will be on the show. And Joe White from Reuters will also be joining us. So join me and Gary Vasilash for some of the best insights into what’s going on in the automotive industry.

EURO NCAP MAKES APP FOR EMERGENCY GUIDES
If rescue workers have to cut their way into a wreck they need to know things like what kind of material the A-pillar is made of, and where to cut to kill power to an EV. So the European New Car Assessment Program, or NCAP, is making that information easy to find with an app called Euro Rescue. It can be downloaded for free on any Android or iOS device and it makes the manufacturer’s emergency response guides available in one place. Users just tap on the brand, the model and model year. Euro NCAP will continually update these emergency guides on the app for any passenger vehicle that it assesses. The app is available in English, French, German and Spanish, but that will also be updated to all European languages by 2023.

2021 TOYOTA SUPRA UPDATES
The 2021 Toyota Supra is scheduled to start hitting American shores this summer with a number of updates. To raise the fun quotient, engineers boosted the turbocharged 3.0L 6-cylinder engine to 382 horsepower, which is up from 335. Toyota projects that extra power will lower the car’s 0 to 60 time by two-tenths, to 3.9 seconds. But if you don’t mind going a little slower – 5 seconds zero to sixty – a new 255 horsepower 4-cylinder version is available with a starting price of just under $43,000, which is 8-grand less than the 6-cylinder. It’s also over 200 pounds lighter, so Toyota did a number of tricks to keep weight distribution similar to the heavier car. It used smaller front brake rotors, single-piston front calipers instead of 4-piston, axed the Active Differential and Adaptive Suspension, used manually adjusted seats instead of power and equipped it with a standard 4-speaker audio system instead of 10 speakers. All Supras will now come standard with an 8.8-inch touchscreen. Also new for 6-cylinder models is a retuned suspension, which focused on increasing roll resistance and enhancing cornering stability. Those are the highlights, but there’s even more that we don’t have the time to get to, so we’ll provide the link if you’d like to learn more about 2021 Supra.

PRODUCTION LUCID AIR MAKING SEPTEMBER DEBUT
Lucid provided a quick update on its operations. It’s gearing up large-scale vehicle development again and making progress with its manufacturing plant in Arizona. Lucid says the production version of the Air sedan will debut online on September 9th.

KIA SHOWS ALL-NEW SEDONA DESIGN SKETCH
Kia also had a bit of a reveal of its own. It showed off this design sketch of the all-new Sedona minivan, which is also known as the Carnival in the Korean market. It gets the latest version of Kia’s tiger-nose grille, which appears to blend more with the headlamps than the previous model. A character line down the side linking the front to the rear also seems to be more pronounced. We’re getting a bit of a Ford Flex-vibe as well, but we’ll see and know more before the third quarter of this year is over, which is when it goes on sale in Korea.

FORD TO OFFER HANDS-FREE CRUISE CONTROL
Tesla has Autopilot, GM has Super Cruise and now Ford is coming out with what it calls Active Driver Assist. It’s part of Ford’s driver assist package, Co-Pilot360. Active Drive Assist is a hands-free cruise control, which can operate on divided highways in the U.S. and Canada. An infrared camera tracks the driver’s eyes and head to make sure they’re paying attention. Visual warnings in the instrument cluster are used to get the driver to take back over if there’s a need, but ignore the warnings long enough, it will switch off and the vehicle will slow down. Ford says it’s already pre-mapped more than 100,000 miles of highway that Active Drive Assist will work on. The feature debuts on some 2021 models and across the entire Mustang Mach-E lineup. And on that vehicle it can be added via an over-the-air update.

BUICK GETS OWN VERSION OF BOLT EV FOR CHINA
Buick’s range of electrified vehicles in China are all named Velite and now it’s getting a version of the Bolt EV called the Velite 7. It launches in China this year with styling that we think is more premium than the Bolt. Also notice how the ‘shark fin’ at the rear helps create a floating roof effect. Buick says the EV will offer a range of 500 kilometers, or about 350 miles but that’s on the NEDC test cycle which is very optimistic. Interestingly, the Bolt is rated at 565 kilometers on the NEDC test. Chinese outlets report the Velite 7 will have a less powerful electric motor than the Bolt, which could help explain the difference. And when we get more info you’ll be the first to know.

MERCEDES LAUNCHES ELECTRIC ARTICULATED BUS
Mercedes is now offering an all-electric version of its Citaro articulated bus. It’s equipped with seven battery packs, which provide a total output capacity of 441 kWh. It comes standard with lithium-ion batteries but customers also have the option to choose solid-state batteries. Depending on the version it can hold up to 146 passengers. The company says it already has 60 orders for the bus and the first deliveries will begin this year.

BMW ADDS 48-VOLT TECH TO 7 SERIES’ DIESEL ENGINES
While so much of what we’re reporting this days involves electric vehicles, BMW is not giving up on diesel engines. And it’s using 48-volt mild-hybrid technology to make sure its diesel engines meet future emission standards. The 6-cylinder diesels for the 7 Series still come in two power levels, but performance and efficiency is up. The less powerful version now makes 286 horsepower, which is 21 more than before, and not only is acceleration to 100 km/h improved by two-tenths of a second, fuel efficiency is up by 0.6-liters per 100 kilometers. The other engine makes 340 horsepower, which has about the same power and acceleration improvement as the other diesel, and returns a fuel savings of 0.4-liters per 100 kilometers. BMW also updated the turbochargers, increased fuel pressure and revised the exhaust after-treatment system. The new engines will be available in the 7 Series next month.

WHAT IS THIS WISCONSIN BARN FIND?
A friend of the family, who goes on hikes all around his home in Wisconsin, sent us some pictures of the rusted out relics he stumbled across. We think it would be cool to help him identify these models, so let’s start with this one. The front end is covered up and a bit mangled, and while we sense a European vibe, the bumper on the roof is clearly not European. We hope the cowl air scoop is what gives this one away. So if you think you know what the heck this is, let us know in the comment section.

That’s it for today’s Autoline Daily, but don’t forget After Hours goes live at 3PM this afternoon.