The discussion covers GM Defense's new drone countermeasure system, investigations into phantom braking in Tesla, Honda, and Freightliner vehicles, and Toyota's creation of a dedicated hydrogen division alongside its EV unit. Fiat revives the classic Topolino name with a unique design, while Volvo unveils its small electric crossover with innovative features. New EV startup Era partners with Meba Battery Systems aiming for long-range vehicles, and Faraday Future struggles with production and trust issues despite taking high-priced orders. The episode highlights key industry moves in defense tech, hydrogen fuel, and electric vehicle innovation.
"...investigated recently over owner complaints about phantom breaking in their vehicles, but it's not just lim..."
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GM Defense, which is a subsidiary of General Motors, has slowly been building up its business over the last year with a number of partnerships, and now the latest is with black Sage Technologies. The two companies announced they were
research and developed what's called a counter Unmanned Aerial System or what looks like it's essentially a control center for a drone, but if there's anyone out there that has more knowledge on this, we'd love to hear from you. Called a
CUAS for short, it will be designed for use on GM Defense's military vehicles.
The two companies are showing off a prototype at the Canadian Association of Defense and Security Industry show, which is going on right now. GM Defense is
aiming to generate a billion dollars a year in revenue by the end of the decade. Tesla and Honda have been investigated recently over owner complaints about phantom breaking
in their vehicles, but it's not just limited to passenger vehicles. Nitze has
opened an investigation into freight liner over trucks that are said to stop for no reason. Eighteen, Cascadia truck owners had filed complaints that the truck's automatic emergency
braking system brought the truck to a halt when there was no obstacle in the road. The investigation involves nearly a quarter of a million trucks made between twenty
seventeen and twenty twenty two, but so far no crashes have been linked to the issue, and last year NITZA launched investigations into Tesla and Honda over similar complaints. Earlier this month, Toyota revealed the name of its new dedicated EV
division called BEEV Factory, and now we're learning that it's also going to have another division completely dedicated to hydrogen and fuel cell development called Hydrogen Factory. Like
BEV Factory, one guy will be in charge. His name is Mitsu Massa
Yamagata, and previous job titles include president of Toyota's powertrain company, head of hybrid development at Gazoo Racing, and more. The main goal of Hydrogen Factory
is to speed up development, and one of the ways it identified it will do that is by strengthening alliances with partners in Europe and China. Toyota says
those are the places where hydrogen mobility is expanding the fastest. Scout Motors,
the new North American EV truck and suv brand from Volkswagen, just hired its head of design, Chris Benjamin. Benjamin joined Scout from Stellantis, where he
was the head of interior design for its North American operations, but we suspect he had experience designing jeeps, which is why Scout wanted him. Prior to
joining Stellantis, Benjamin worked for Mercedes, Benz, BMW and Volvo and ask for Scout. It's aiming to launch its first vehicles in twenty twenty six.
God Scheffler we pioneer motion, electrifying mobility, manufacturing smarter, reducing CO two emissions, making energy production clean. Scheffler Pioneer's motion to advance how the world
moves. Fiat is getting its own version of the Satroan Army, and it's
reviving an iconic name to do it. It's called the Topolino, which means
little mouse in Italian and was the name given to the original Fiat five hundred made from nineteen thirty six until nineteen fifty five. The new Topolino gets its
own unique styling compared to the Ami and in place, the doors are the kind of rope partitions you might expect to see at a movie theater or a bouncer holding to get into a club. However, no word on an exact
launch for the Topolino yet. Volvo is giving us our best look yet at
its all new small electric crossover at the EX thirty, and it clearly carries over very distinctive Volvo design features highlighted by the front rear lighting. The e
X thirty is likely to ride on parent company Geeli's Sea platform, which would mean it can accommodate a number of motor, battery size and battery chemistry combinations.
Volvo also revealed it will come with a clever multi function center console and a first of its kind soundbar that stretches across the entire dashboard. You may
have heard us report on an evy startup in the past called Era that's hoping to come out with a pretty slick looking electric sedan and suv, and now it's picked Meba Battery Systems as its battery supplier. MIBA makes cylindrical cells that
come in a number of dimensions and in NMC or LFP. Chemistries a Hiera
says its battery pack could be up to one hundred and twenty kilowatt hours and estimates range at up to eight hundred kilometers or about five hundred miles. It's
also targeting peak voltage of nine hundred and twenty five volts, which would allow charging rates of up to three hundred and fifty kilowatts. Era Sedan will make
its public debut in the middle of June, and while we think its vehicles have some very interesting design features, it's still way too early to tell if they'll ever make it to the market. And just look at another EV startup
like Faraday Future, which has been an absolute roller coaster. It is making
cars, it's not making cars. It does have enough money, it doesn't
have enough money. But even so, Faraday is still hanging on by a
thread. It's taking orders for a limited edition of its F nine one model
in the US and China, but it's quite pricey. It costs three hundred
and nine thousand dollars and only three hundred will be produced. The company is
also taking pre orders for the regular F nine one, but it did not reveal pricing. But this is a very hard company to trust. It was
founded in twenty fourteen, but it still hasn't delivered any vehicles to customers and that brings us to the end of today show. Thanks for making Auto Line
a part of your day. Altoughline Daily is brought to you by Bridgestone Solutions
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