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Tag: Autos

  • Ford unveils new F-150 Raptor R pickup with 700 horsepower

    DETROIT — As Ford Motor ramps up manufacturing of its electrical F-150 pickup, it isn’t giving up on providing new, extremely winning functionality fashions with gas engines.

    The Detroit automaker Monday morning unveiled the F-150 Raptor R, a brand new model of its high-performance, off-road pickup with a supercharged 5.2-liter V-8 engine that produces 700 horsepower and 640 foot-pounds of torque. The truck will get started at $109,145, together with vacation spot and supply fees.

    Amid pent-up call for and report excessive costs, automakers had been including functionality variants to their lineups to enhance benefit margins earlier than they transition extra to electrical automobiles, which is able to be offering excessive functionality however have decrease margins than gas-powered automobiles.

    2023 Ford F-150 Raptor R

    Ford

    The brand new “R” model appears very similar to the corporate’s F-150 Raptor, nevertheless it comprises some design tweaks and provides an important spice up in functionality and off-road portions. For comparability, the common 2022 F-150 Raptor is powered by way of a three.5-liter EcoBoost V-6 engine that produces 450 horsepower and 510 foot-pounds of torque. Ford mentioned the Raptor R’s best velocity is 112 mph, restricted by way of the automobile’s 37-inch tires.

    Ford has in large part ruled the high-performance pickup truck marketplace since launching the primary Raptor type in 2009. However in recent times, Stellantis’ Ram Vehicles logo has been grabbing headlines with its Ram 1500 TRX, a 702-horsepower pickup with supercharged 6.2-liter V-8 engine and 650 foot-pounds of torque.

    The brand new Raptor falls simply shy of the functionality of the Ram TRX, nevertheless it gives other functionality portions. It is also the highest-powered engine Ford gives. The corporate up to now used the engine for the Ford Mustang Shelby GT500.

    2023 Ford F-150 Raptor R

    Ford

    Carl Widmann, leader engineer of Ford functionality, mentioned the automobile is the results of shoppers “tough the sound and gear of a V8 again in Raptor.” Ford hasn’t introduced a V-8 engine in a Raptor type since 2014.

    Manufacturing of the F-150 Raptor R will get started within the fall at Ford’s Dearborn Truck Plant in Michigan, the corporate mentioned. Ordering for the automobile opens Monday via franchised Ford sellers.

    Present Raptor vans get started at about $70,000 — round $40,000 over a base F-150 however more cost effective than the highest luxurious model of the F-150 that begins at kind of $77,000.

    2023 Ford F-150 Raptor R

    Ford

  • Elon Musk asks court docket to reject Twitter’s request for fast trial

    “The previous two years were a fully nightmare of provide chain disruptions, something after any other, and we don’t seem to be out of it but,” Tesla CEO Elon Musk stated.

    Patrick T. Fallon | Reuters

    Elon Musk desires time to organize for an ordeal over his contentious withdrawal from an settlement to shop for Twitter for $44 billion, in step with a submitting in a Delaware chancery court docket by way of his legal professionals on Friday.

    Musk’s crew says the trial must wait till subsequent 12 months, after Twitter had asked expedited remedy and a listening to as early as this September.

    Of their submitting, an opposition to a movement filed previous by way of Twitter, Musk’s legal professionals alleged the corporate made a “unexpected request for warp pace after two months of foot-dragging and obfuscation,” and stated this was once Twitter’s “newest tactic to shroud the reality about junk mail accounts.”

    An expedited listening to, Musk’s aspect says, could be an unfair tactic and a strategy to quilt up the level of the platform’s issues of faux accounts. Previous this week, Twitter sued Musk, alleging the Tesla CEO was once enticing a foul religion effort to again out of the deal.

    Musk’s legal professionals argued, “it will be an ‘atypical feat’ to take a look at a posh busted deal case inside of even 5 to 6 months,” and so they say “preserving trial in February 2023 would stability the pursuits of the events and the Court docket.”

    Twitter was once in search of a listening to inside of about 60 days.

    Twitter declined to remark at the subject. Musk did not reply to a request for remark.

    WATCH: Twitter accuses Musk of riding inventory worth decrease

  • Musk says Tesla can decrease automobile costs if inflation ‘calms down’

    Tesla CEO Elon Musk stated in a tweet Friday that the electrical automobile corporate may decrease costs if inflation “calms down.”

    The Bureau of Exertions Statistics reported a higher-than-expected inflation fee this week with the shopper worth index emerging 9.1% from a 12 months in the past.

    Tesa greater the costs of all of its automobile fashions within the U.S. and China in March. The corporate once more hiked costs throughout its fashions as just lately as June when it greater the price of its Fashion Y long-range from $62,990 to $65,990.

    Musk tweeted in March that Tesla and his different corporate, SpaceX, had been each “seeing important fresh inflation force in uncooked fabrics & logistics.”

    Musk stated in June forward of the second one worth upward thrust that he had a “tremendous dangerous feeling” in regards to the economic system and would want to minimize 10% of jobs at Tesla, in keeping with an electronic mail at first reported by way of Reuters.

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    WATCH: The EV trade is going through a nickel scarcity as costs leap right through Russia’s struggle in Ukraine

  • Hyundai unveils new Ioniq 6 EV — an ‘electrified streamliner’ with distinctive design

    The latest electrical car from Hyundai Motor is a sedan with a novel bubbly design.

    The South Korean automaker unveiled the Ioniq 6 Wednesday evening as an “electrified streamliner,” a nod to its aerodynamic design that American citizens would possibly know perfect throughout the design of an Airstream trailer. It is a main shift in styling from the well-received Ioniq 5 EV, which went on sale previous this yr.

    Hyundai is recently promoting the second-most EVs within the U.S. in the back of Tesla.

    “Every Ioniq car can have other design persona … all of us need our designers to at all times hook up with shoppers at the emotional degree,” stated SangYup Lee, government vp and head of Hyundai design, throughout a digital media match.

    Hyundai is predicted to start out manufacturing of the automobile at a manufacturing unit in South Korea throughout the 3rd quarter. It’s scheduled to move on sale within the U.S. throughout the primary quarter of subsequent yr.

    Pricing of the car used to be no longer introduced.

    Hyundai expects the automobile to reach 610 kilometers (380 miles) of vary on a unmarried rate, in line with international requirements. Then again, the ones trying out requirements range from the ones within the U.S., that means the U.S. vary might be other.

    The inner of the car options two 12-inch monitors for motive force data and leisure.

    The Ioniq 6 would be the 3rd all-electric car within the U.S. beneath the Hyundai logo, following the Kona and Ioniq 5 crossovers. The South Korean automaker additionally owns Kia, however the manufacturers perform independently within the U.S.

    Business analysis company LMC Car expects Hyundai, together with Kia and its luxurious Genesis logo, to promote the second-most EVs within the U.S. this yr, in the back of simplest Tesla, which delivered greater than 936,000 EVs globally closing yr (the corporate does no longer smash its deliveries down by means of area).

    Throughout the first six months of the yr, Car Information stories, Hyundai, Kia and Genesis manufacturers bought a blended 34,518 EVs within the U.S. — in the back of Tesla’s gross sales, in step with the file, however forward of the 22,979 EV gross sales from Ford Motor.

  • American citizens are paying record-high costs for brand new cars

    An indication advertises to buy vehicles at a used automotive dealership in Arlington, Virginia, February 15, 2022.

    Saul Loeb | AFP | Getty Pictures

    DETROIT – If buyers are in search of indicators of a recession or weakening client spending, they are able to skip over new car costs, which hit a brand new listing in June.

    Fueled via pent-up client call for, low car inventories and emerging gross sales of luxurious cars, Cox Automobile reported this week the common transaction value of a brand new car ultimate month used to be $48,083 – a 1.9% building up from Would possibly and better than the former listing of $47,202 set in December.

    The common sale value used to be a part of a broader building up in client spending in June, in line with the Bureau of Exertions Statistics. The shopper value index, a measure of on a regular basis items and products and services, soared 9.1% from a 12 months in the past, above the 8.8% Dow Jones estimate.

    A lot of the inflation upward thrust got here from gas costs, which larger 11.2% at the month and simply shy of 60% for the 12-month duration. New and used car costs posted respective per 30 days beneficial properties of 0.7% and 1.6%, in line with the BLS.

    Cox mentioned June persevered this 12 months’s streak of shoppers paying greater than the producer’s recommended retail value, or “sticky label value,” for a brand new car, in line with Cox. The automobile analysis company reported new cars from Honda Motor, Kia and Mercedes-Benz transacted on moderate between 6.5% and eight.7% over MSRP.

    –Jeff Cox contributed to this record.

  • Tesla AI chief Andrej Karpathy pronounces he is leaving the corporate

    A Tesla Fashion S automotive provided with Autopilot

    David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Photographs

    Tesla AI chief Andrej Karpathy introduced on Twitter Wednesday that he’s not running for the electrical car maker.

    He wrote, “It is been a really perfect excitement to lend a hand Tesla against its objectives during the last 5 years and a hard choice to section techniques. In that point, Autopilot graduated from lane retaining to town streets and I sit up for seeing the exceptionally robust Autopilot crew proceed that momentum.”

    He added, “I don’t have any concrete plans for what is subsequent however glance to spend extra time revisiting my long-term passions round technical paintings in AI, open supply and schooling.”

    CEO Elon Musk thanked Karpathy for his paintings in reaction.

    A crew of senior device studying scientists and engineers reported in without delay to Karpathy, who had lately taken a months-long sabbatical from Tesla.

    Tesla cars have accounted for just about 70% of reported crashes involving complicated driver-assistance methods since June 2021, consistent with federal figures launched remaining month. Officers warned that the information was once incomplete no longer supposed to signify which carmaker’s methods may well be most secure.

    It is a growing tale please take a look at again for updates.

  • Panasonic reportedly development new manufacturing facility in Kansas to supply batteries for Tesla and remainder of EV trade

    An aerial view of the Tesla Gigafactory close to Sparks, Nevada

    Bob Robust | Reuters

    Panasonic is making plans to construct a brand new battery manufacturing facility in Kansas to supply high-capacity cells for Tesla, in line with a file out Wednesday from Nikkei Asia.

    Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly, a Democrat, has scheduled a information convention in Topeka these days at 5 native time the place she’s anticipated to announce main points at the Panasonic plant.

    Panasonic prior to now invested in and collectively operates a battery manufacturing facility with Tesla in Sparks, Nevada, outdoor of Reno, referred to as the Gigafactory (or Gigafactory 1). That sprawling facility was once sluggish to reach profitability because of excessive defect charges and slower-than-anticipated mass manufacturing, Nikkei reported, nevertheless it changed into winning in 2021.

    Tesla’s urge for food for battery cells is expanding together with its ambitions to ramp up automobile manufacturing at new factories close to Austin, Texas, and Berlin. The corporate reported annual automobile deliveries of 936,172 in 2021, an 87% building up from 2020. The price of battery fabrics is emerging with inflation, higher electrical automobile manufacturing, and provide chain headaches exacerbated by means of the continued pandemic and Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine.

    An area information outlet, the Kansas Town Superstar, prior to now reported that Panasonic might find its new manufacturing facility, which is predicted to make use of round 4,000 folks, at a former ammunition manufacturing facility in De Soto, Kansas. The governor’s place of work and Panasonic didn’t in an instant reply to requests for remark.

    Thus far, Elon Musk’s electrical automobile corporate has most commonly trusted Panasonic and different distributors together with CATL in China, for battery cells that pass into their automobiles’ high-voltage battery packs, and into the corporate’s power garage methods for house, industrial and grid-scale installations.

    However Tesla has additionally been operating to supply and commercially use its personal 4680 battery cells. It bought Canadian battery production corporations together with Hibar Techniques to assist with this goal.

    In October 2021, Tesla stated it will exchange the battery cellular chemistry that it makes use of in all of its usual differ cars to make use of lithium-iron-phosphate (LFP) cells moderately than nickel-cobalt-aluminum (NCA) cells, which Tesla meant to stay the use of in its longer-range cars.

    Panasonic isn’t on my own in increasing its battery production investments within the U.S.

    In January this 12 months, Normal Motors and LG Power introduced plans to speculate greater than $2 billion into a brand new battery plant in Michigan. And Jeep-maker Stellantis and Samsung are making an investment round $2.5 billion right into a battery plant in Kokomo, Indiana, to assist the automaker transition to electrical cars.

    Consistent with analysis by means of Canalys, world gross sales of battery electrical cars amounted to 4.5 million devices in 2021, representing about 69% of general electrical automobile gross sales together with plug-in hybrid electrics.

  • Stocks of Tianqi Lithium droop round 10% in first day of buying and selling in Hong Kong

    Stocks of Tianqi Lithium slumped about 10% of their Hong Kong marketplace debut Wednesday, after the Chinese language corporate raised about $1.7 billion within the town’s largest checklist thus far this yr.

    The inventory traded at round 74.50 Hong Kong bucks ($9.49), less than the be offering value of HK$82 ($10.45) a percentage. It slipped to as little as HK$72.65 ahead of paring again some losses.

    Tianqi Lithium, which used to be already indexed in Shenzhen, is without doubt one of the global’s best providers of rechargeable battery parts for electrical automobiles.

    “We’re indexed in China already and it’s already an excellent, giant platform for financing. However it’s restricted in China,” Frank Ha, the chief director and CEO at Tianqi Lithium, instructed CNBC’s “Streets Indicators Asia” on Wednesday.

    “We going into the Hong Kong marketplace this is our means of crossing the globe. We want to make a world platform for financing. That is why that we regarded as after which review the placement. I feel the present time is the most productive time that we will be able to come right here to record available in the market,” he added.

    Learn extra about China from CNBC Professional

    The corporate bought 164.12 million stocks in its secondary checklist in Hong Kong, in step with its regulatory filings. The percentage sale breaks a monthslong drought for massive choices in Hong Kong, the place finances raised between January and June fell extra 90% from the former yr. 

    Tianqi’s Hong Kong providing has drawn seven cornerstone traders which are set to snap up about 38% of the checklist, the prospectus confirmed.

    Tianqi Lithium’s outlook

    Ha mentioned the electrical automobile marketplace is appearing energy globally and isn’t just restricted to China.

    “We will be able to see that during Europe and within the different puts on the planet there’s nonetheless very sturdy call for of EV,” he mentioned. Ha added electrical automobile call for within the subsequent 5 to 6 years is prone to keep increased as extra nations pledge to change into carbon impartial by means of 2050.

    The present marketplace sentiment is somewhat difficult however given basics of Tianqi Lithium, the corporate’s income attainable is healthier than others given “very top lithium costs,” mentioned Dennis Ip, head of energy and utilities, at Daiwa Capital markets.

    “Tianqi Lithium percentage value may be very pushed by means of the lithium compound costs as smartly,” he instructed CNBC on Wednesday.

    “We nonetheless assume that lithium value will stay sturdy in the second one part this yr, however subsequent yr will probably be difficult,” as call for can also be suffering from the macroeconomic setting, he added.

    Learn extra about electrical automobiles from CNBC Professional

  • Chinese language EV maker XPeng’s robotics arm raises $100 million to deliver robots to families in 2 years

    XPeng continues to be targeted in boosting the gross sales of its electrical automobiles. But it surely has been specializing in development out long run companies in flying automobiles and robotics.

    Qilai Shen | Bloomberg | Getty Photographs

    XPeng Robotics, the associate corporate of Chinese language electrical carmaker XPeng, on Tuesday mentioned it raised $100 million as a part of its intention to commercialize family robotics within the subsequent two years.

    The financing was once led by way of high-profile undertaking capital company IDG Capital, with XPeng additionally collaborating.

    XPeng Robotics mentioned in a press unlock that the cash could be used to make stronger its analysis and building funding in robot {hardware} and device, recruit ability, boost up product building and spice up generation and product competitiveness.

    The corporate mentioned it expects its first robots to go into families within the subsequent two years.

    Learn extra about electrical automobiles from CNBC Professional

    He Xiaopeng, CEO of XPeng, sees robotics and passenger drones as an extension of the corporate’s focal point on transportation.

    “With the improvement of generation, the type of mobility will evolve from wheels to wings, propellers, 4 legs or 2 toes,” he advised CNBC ultimate yr in an interview.

    XPengis no longer the one electrical carmaker transferring into robotics. U.S. rival Tesla is operating on a humanoid robotic named Optimus which the corporate mentioned may cross into manufacturing subsequent yr.

  • Elon Musk says it is time for Trump to ‘sail into the sundown’

    President Donald Trump talks with Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk at Trump Tower closing February.

    Evan Vucci | AP

    Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk stated Monday that he thinks former President Donald Trump must, “hold up his hat & sail into the sundown.”

    Writing on Twitter, the place Musk has greater than 100 million fans, the fame CEO stated: “I do not hate the person, however it is time for Trump to hold up his hat & sail into the sundown. Dems must additionally name off the assault – are not making it in order that Trump’s simplest solution to live on is to regain the Presidency.”

    A bipartisan Space make a selection committee is undertaking public hearings to give preliminary findings from a yearlong investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021 rise up on the U.S. Capitol by means of a violent mob of Trump’s supporters. The panel’s subsequent public listening to is scheduled for Tuesday morning.

    Over the weekend, Trump referred to as Elon Musk a “bulls— artist” claiming that Musk stated he voted for Trump in earlier conversations between the 2 males. However Musk tweeted to disclaim that declare and hit again at Trump on Monday night.

    The Tesla CEO up to now stated his first vote for a Republican was once for Mayra Flores, the winner of a different election in South Texas in June.

    Closing month, Musk additionally printed that he was once “leaning” towards balloting for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, must he run for president in 2024.

    Musk’s feedback about Trump got here after a demanding day for his companies.

    SpaceX, his reusable rocket corporate, performed a floor check of a rocket booster that led to an sudden explosion in Boca Chica, Texas.

    Musk additionally confronted a prison problem from Twitter on Monday, after in the hunt for to terminate an previous deal he struck to procure the social community for $54.20 in step with proportion. Twitter says his foundation for terminating the deal was once “invalid and wrongful.”

    Musk’s electrical car maker Tesla noticed stocks decline on Monday after Shanghai ramped up mass-testing for Covid following reviews of 2 dozen new circumstances there. The checking out raised fears of a resurgence and extra lockdowns that might as soon as once more abate Tesla’s manufacturing unit operations in China.