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AD #3596 - Aston To Use Lucid Tech; Toyota To Build Its Own In-House Gigapresses; Fiat Ditches Gray Car Colors

AD #3596 - Aston To Use Lucid Tech; Toyota To Build Its Own In-House Gigapresses; Fiat Ditches Gray Car Colors

Autoline Daily Jun 26, 2023 10 min
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About this episode

Aston Martin partners with Lucid Motors to access advanced EV technology for its 2025 electric car launch, while Toyota plans to build its own in-house gigapresses to streamline EV production by 2026. The episode also covers industry trends like the rise of Chinese automotive brands, GM's raw material deals for EV batteries, and Renault's Alpine brand expanding into the US and China with new electric models. Additionally, Fiat announces it will stop producing gray cars, opting for vibrant Italian-inspired colors. The discussion highlights shifts in manufacturing, market dynamics, and the growing importance of connected car technology.

Topics: aston martin and lucid partnership toyota gigapresses electric vehicle production chinese automotive market gm raw material deals renault alpine expansion fiat color strategy connected car technology automotive market trends ev battery costs
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This is Autoline Daily, the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry.
Lawrence Stroll, the chairman of Aston Martin sure, isn't wasting any time ever. Since the billionaire Canadian took control of the storied British sports car company,
he's been on a tear to modernize its product lineup and put everything on a solid financial foundation. And today Aston announced it's going to get access to
Lucid Motors twin motor drive unit, its battery technology, and its onboard charging system called Wonderbox. Lucid will also work with Aston to integrate its technology.
The deal is worth over four hundred and fifty million dollars for Lucid and it's a big deal for both companies. For Lucid it's a big financial development as
well as a strong endorsement of its technology, and for Aston it's a quick path to getting some of the best ev technology in the world for its first electric car, which is scheduled to hit the market in twenty twenty five.
Toyota was stunned when Tesla's Model Y pushed the Corolla aside to become the best selling car in the world in the first quarter. Now, Toyota has a
new business unit dedicated to developing electric vehicles, what it calls the beev Factory.
It followed in Tesla's footsteps by announcing that it would use large castings instead of stampings to make parts of its body structures, but Toyota is also going to build its own in house giga presses. Currently, the biggest casting machines
in Japan are four thousand tons, but sixty five hundred ton machines are needed for its giga castings. Toyota says it takes thirty minutes of combined manufacturing time
to stamp out and well body panels versus about a minute and a half to make giga castings. Toyota plans to have its own large castings in its electric
vehicles by twenty twenty six. Alex Partners released its annual Global Automotive Outlook this
morning, and here are some of the top bullet points. New car sales
in Europe will never return to their pre COVID levels and they'll run at an annual rate that's three million units less than before the ice is melting, and sales of piston powered vehicles will never recover to where they were before COVID.
Chinese brands will out sell foreign brands in China this year, and by twenty thirty they'll have sixty five percent of the Chinese market. Chinese brands are outperforming
in exterior and interior design and with tech features, especially with driver assistance systems.
The raw materials needed to make evs cost four thousand, six hundred dollars more than what's needed for ice vehicles, but that's based on NMC batteries.
LFP batteries cut that cost differential in half. There will likely be a UAW
strike this fall, but the real question is whether it last couple of weeks or three to four months. A couple of weeks is manageable, but several
months would be a disaster. Renault has big plans for Lpene, it's sports
car brand, and the big news is it's expanding into the US and China.
More on that in a moment. By the end of twenty twenty six,
Lpne expects to generate two billion euros in revenue and to have a fully electric lineup. But that's not that hard considering it only sells one model,
the A one ten. That changes sometime next year when it's scheduled to launch
the all electric A two ninety, which is lpene's version of the Renault five hatchback. The A two ninety is followed in twenty twenty five by what it
calls a c SECNT crossover GT or what is likely a fastback SUV. For
models beyond these, LPNE is developing its own high performance EV platform that will support up to seven vehicles by twenty thirty, the first of which will be an all new version of the A one ten that's scheduled to come out by the end of twenty twenty six, and we wouldn't be surprised if that's the first model that Alpine offers in the US and China. It says its first
vehicles will be on sale in those markets by twenty twenty seven. But this
is not the only way that Alpine is expanding. It's got its site set
on Hollywood. Alpine's racing division, which competes in Formula One, is getting
a two hundred million euro infusion from a group of investors, and there's some pretty big names in that group, including Ryan Reynolds, Rob Mecklehenny and Michael B. Jordan. The investors now control a twenty four percent an equity stake
in Alpine Racing and with the expansion of its lineup, market presence and racing efforts, Alpine expects an operating profit above ten percent and to generate eight billion euros in revenue by twenty thirty. And who knows, maybe Lpene Racing will
have a Hollywood ending like the Wrexham football club. At Schiffler 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. General Motors is locking
up the raw materials it needs to make batteries for electric vehicles. It recently
made deals for lithium and nickel, and now it just signed an agreement with Australia mining company Element twenty five to supply it with thirty two thousand, five hundred metric tons of manganese sulfate. As part of the deal, GM will
invest eighty five million dollars in Element twenty five to help it build a facility in Louisiana which will process manganese mind in Australia starting in twenty twenty five.
GM says The deal will help it reach its goal of producing a million evs annually in North America, but as automakers scramble to lock up raw materials for evs, there's not as much demand for materials needed for ICYE vehicles. Palladium,
which is used in catalytic converters to help reduce emissions, has seen its price drop dramatically over the past year. In twenty twenty two, it hit
a peak of three thousand, four hundred and forty dollars an ounce, but then the prices tumbled more than sixty percent to one thousand, two hundred and seventy dollars and ounce. Part of the reason for the drop is the growth
in evs, which don't need catalytic converters, and with EV sales expected to reach fifteen million units this year, analysts expect palladium sales to fall by one point five to two point two five million ounces, so prices will likely go down further, and this may help explain why automakers are so optimistic about being able to generate big profits from connected car technology, like certain ota updates and subscription services. The Hundai Group first launched connected car tech in Korea in two
thousand and three, which then started expanding to the rest of the world in two thousand and eleven, but it took the group until twenty twenty one to hit five million subscribers. However, in under two years that number is doubled
to ten million, and it expects to go to twenty million by twenty twenty six. With that kind of growth and that kind of reach, automakers are
expecting to be able to connect with people even more throughout the day, plus those people will be generating a lot of data. Car prices in Russia are
skyrocketing due to a lack of inventory and a weak ruble. Prices have doubled
or even tripled in some cases because of the high cost of importing vehicles, and even Russian made vehicles like the recently revived Moskvitch brand, are becoming more expensive. But demand for luxury vehicles remains high, which is pushing prices up
even more. One BMW dealer is selling X fives, X sevens and seven
series between one hundred and eighty one thousand and two hundred and forty two thousand dollars, and even Chinese vehicles are pricey. Voya, which is the premium
ev brand from dong Fung is selling its Passion Sedan for nearly one hundred grand.
Through May, more than two hundred and ninety thousand vehicles have been sold in Russia, which is a drop of nearly fourteen percent. And here's something
we can get behind. Fiat announced it's no longer making any gray cars.
From now on, all of its paint colors will be inspired by the Italian Sun, Sea, Sky, and Earth. Its first model to go grayless
is the Fiat five hundred, and that brings us to the end of today's show. Thanks for making Autoline a part of your day. Autoline Daily is
brought to you by Bridgestone Solutions for your journey, Intrepid Control Systems over the year engineering boost your game, and by Scheffler We pioneer motion. We want
to know what drives your testing. OTA Connected Car Diagnostics, remote Testing.
Intrepid Control Systems is here to help you work from anywhere. Intrepid Control Systems
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