Trade News

DETROIT — Ford Motor Co. is again delaying its return-to-office plans amid the rise of the omicron variant of COVID-19.

The automaker most recently planned to bring back salaried employees with a new hybrid work model beginning in January. The company told employees Monday that it will begin phasing in certain groups of salaried workers in February, with the bulk of the work force not returning until March.

"The state of COVID-19 remains fluid, and despite the success of our ongoing safety protocols and increased vaccination rates, we are shifting the start date of the hybrid work model to March," Ford said in a statement. "We will begin with a pilot phase for select non-site-dependent employees in February and in March, we expect remaining team members to begin working flexibly between Ford campuses and remote options."

The new hybrid work model will allow workers to go into offices only when necessary. Ford said it was redesigning its office space to b…

Ford and Subaru are remarkably different automakers without a whole lot in common. One is American, one is Japanese. One is a truck giant, the other is not.

But in exclusive in-depth interviews with us that we share this week, their CEOs tell us that they’re both dealing with the same phenomenon: Both companies are witnessing powerful demand that they are scrambling to cope with.

For Subaru, a small global player with a big American following, that demand is manifesting itself as an operating challenge. Subaru is selling more vehicles than it can make. Due to the chronic industry-wide microchip shortage, Subaru’s back orders of vehicles are climbing monthly, CEO Tomomi Nakamura tells us with great transparency. 

“In a normal situation, sold orders are around 5,000 to 6,000 units. It’s currently around 45,000 units,” Nakamura explains. “And each month, we’re seeing about a 10,000-unit increase.” Read more about Sometimes the demand takes you by surprise

From easing the driver shortage to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, Finch Fulton, VP of policy and strategy at Locomation, and Andrew Smith, CEO at Outrider, foresee automation offering substantial benefits in the trucking realm. They outline two distinct approaches to the market in the near term.

How do I subscribe?

Apple Podcasts: “Shift: A podcast about mobility” is available on the iTunes Store and through the ‘Podcast’ app pre-installed on all iOS devices. Click here to subscribe.

Spotify: "Shift: A podcast about mobility" can be streamed through Spotify on your desktop, tablet or mobile device. Click here to subscribe.

Google Play: "Shift: A podcast about mobility" is available on Android devices through the Google Play store. Click here to subscribe.

Lucid Motors is enjoying a wild ride to the top tier of the EV pack. The quick pace of events is like a quarter-mile blast in the automaker's 1,111-hp Lucid Air Dream Edition.

Since late October, Lucid delivered its first Air sedans to paying customers, matched Ford Motor Co. in market value and received a slew of industry accolades for its debut model.

But the California startup now faces growing pains as it takes on market leader Tesla, along with Rivian and the entire legacy auto industry. For now, Lucid has just a single product: an executive sedan with a six-figure price tag and limited production capacity.

"We have had a great deal of activity recently, and we've been very excited by some of the awards coming our way," Zak Edson, Lucid's senior director of sales and service, told Automotive News. Among them: MotorTrend's 2022 Car of the Year award.

"We've been particularly excited being able to deliver cars to cu…

National Auto Care has been buying finance-and-insurance agencies in a prominent example of a broader consolidation trend within that industry.

"It's going at a fast pace," Colonnade Advisors CEO Gina Cocking, an industry analyst, said of F&I agency consolidation.

Cocking estimated there are about 1,200 F&I agencies nationwide.

Courtney Hoffman, NAC senior vice president of mergers and acquisitions, said she thought her company would be one of the leaders left standing as the "highly fragmented" industry coalesces to produce a handful of large players.

"I don't think it [consolidation] stops," Hoffman said.

In October, NAC tallied its 10th agency acquisition in 18 months — Oklahoma City-based Mojo Consulting. The news followed its August announcement of five purchases: Ace Financial Development Group in Portage, Mich.; Pinnacle Dealer Services in Arizona; Pritchard Insurance in Stanwood, Wash.; Profit Concepts in Ogden, Utah; and …

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Not so many years ago, the Southeastern U.S. was largely off the map of the North American auto industry. But over the past three decades, states in that region have attracted — and continue to attract — billions in auto manufacturing and supply chain project investments. At a gathering of the multistate Southern Automotive Conference here, Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey, 77, Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves, 47, and South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, 74, sat together to talk about the growth of the industry in the South, with News Editor Lindsay Chappell moderating their discussion. These are edited excerpts.

Q: Each of your states has been enormously successful in attracting auto industry investment where none used to be. What made that happen?

A: Ivey: We in Alabama are proud of our work. We're a right-to-work state, and our people want to work and provide for their families. In Alabama, we customize incentive packages resources. We have a work force…

Vietnamese conglomerate Vingroup JSC is restructuring its automobile unit VinFast ahead of a planned U.S. initial public offering in the second half of 2022.

Vingroup’s 51.52 percent stake in VinFast will be transferred to a Singapore subsidiary, the company said in an emailed statement on Saturday.

The EV maker, which aims to roll out electric crossovers in the U.S., Canada and Europe late next year, is working with investment banks to prepare for an IPO that would make VinFast one of the first Vietnamese companies to be traded in the U.S.

VinFast could raise as much as $3 billion from an IPO, people familiar with the matter have said. The company expects to have a post-IPO value of $25 billion to $60 billion, Vice Chairwoman Le Thi Thu Thuy told Bloomberg News in November. The company is also in talks with potential investors to raise billions of dollars in both debt and equity to finance its electric vehicle expansion in the U.S., Thuy said in a sep…

Beset by margin compression on vehicle sales last fall, Roy Lacey, dealer manager of Rapids Honda, started looking for ways to cut expenses. One possibility was as clear as an untinted window: The dealership in Coon Rapids, Minn., was paying vendors more than $500,000 a year to install aftermarket products.

"To take back some profits, we had to take a look at things we were outsourcing," Lacey said. "We were paying other companies $50,000 to $60,000 a month to install accessories. I thought to myself, 'This is crazy.' "

After conferring with Lance Spah, the store's service manager, Lacey decided the dealership — about 15 miles northwest of downtown Minneapolis — would bring in-house all window-tinting and protective-film installations as well as rustproofing and undercoating applications.

After in-house installations went fully operational in March, significant financial gains followed.

In March 2020, gross profit for internal service department…

Ford Motor Co.'s Blue Oval City project, which aims to build electric vehicles and batteries in the small town of Stanton, Tenn., ranks as one of the biggest industrial undertakings in the automaker's history. It also will be the largest investment in the state's history, with a $5.6 billion price tag.

It's an undertaking that will change the landscape of the area — for the community, for its work force and the people who live nearby, and for suppliers now plotting future plant investments, says one of the economic development leaders who helped Ford launch the project.

"This is not just going to be a local impact," said Chris Berryman, who worked with Ford in his role as an auto industry recruiter for Tennessee Valley Authority Economic Development. "It won't be only a seven-county impact. It's going to be multistate. It will have an impact across West Tennessee and into the eastern section of Arkansas. It will reach into southern Kentucky and North Mississip…

Is Bob Brockman truly cognitively impaired to the extent that he won't be able to help his lawyers defend him against federal tax evasion charges? Or is he, as prosecutors contend, exaggerating his symptoms to avoid a trial?

A federal judge will make that determination now that a competency hearing for the former Reynolds and Reynolds Co. CEO has concluded.

Among the evidence U.S. District Judge George Hanks Jr. will weigh: Testimony from medical experts, close contacts of Brockman and current and former executives of privately held Reynolds during the hearing that spanned eight days in November in a Houston courtroom. Hanks also will consider experts' reports, medical records, brain images and filings from prosecutors and defense lawyers outlining their arguments.

Hanks has not specified a decision date, though it's expected in the new year. Hanks last week granted a request by Brockman's lawyers and prosecutors seeking more time to file briefs …