Q1 earnings means how a company did financially in the first three months of the year. The podcast is using it to show how automakers’ profits and cash flow changed.
EBIT is a way to measure how profitable a company’s core operations are, before considering interest payments and taxes. The podcast uses it to show how badly profits fell.
Net profit is the final profit number after all costs and taxes are counted. The hosts mention it to show the companies ended up making much less money.
EVs are electric cars. The podcast is saying the percentage of sales coming from EVs changed, which reflects how fast companies are selling electric models.
Free cash flow is the money a company has left after it pays its day-to-day bills and major spending. If it drops sharply, it can limit how much the company can invest or stay afloat.
Vertical integration means a company makes more of the parts it needs itself instead of relying on outside suppliers. That can help with cost, timing, and supply reliability—especially for tricky technologies.
Lidar is a sensor that uses lasers to map the road around the car. “Solid-state” lidar is a newer design that doesn’t rely on moving parts, which could make it easier to fit in a vehicle and potentially more dependable.
Term
camera and radar system
Cameras help the car “see” what’s in front, and radar helps it measure how far away objects are and how fast they’re moving. This segment says the early R2s get a better version of those sensors.
Amazon is mentioned because it used to own a large portion of Rivian, but the segment says that ownership has shifted. It’s basically a business/ownership update based on official filings.
Volkswagen Group is mentioned because it bought more shares in Rivian. The segment also says Volkswagen and Rivian are testing vehicles together and expect new models to launch soon.
The Tesla Semi is a large electric truck used to move goods on highways. Instead of using diesel fuel, it runs on electricity. It’s getting attention because the first trucks are starting to be delivered and used for hauling.
A gigafactory is a huge factory built for making electric-vehicle parts—especially batteries—at very large scale. Here, it’s mentioned because Tesla is ramping up truck production nearby.
This is a government program that provides vouchers (financial help) to encourage cleaner trucks and buses. The segment uses it to show how many EV trucks people applied for in California.
Days supply is a way to measure how quickly cars are selling. If a model has fewer days supply, it means dealers are selling through their inventory faster.
An engine with 16 cylinders means the car has sixteen “power chambers.” More cylinders can help an engine make a lot of power, which is why it mattered for that racing record.
Top speed is the highest speed the car can reach. They mention it to highlight how fast the old racing car was.
LIVE
Speaker 1: This is out of Ligne Daily, the show dedicated to enthusiasts of the global automotive industry. Three automakers just posted
their Q one earnings and it looks like a financial massacre.
We've got the results from a legacy automaker BMW, a legacy heavy truck manufacturer Daimler, and an evy startup Lucid, and despite the diversity of their products, they all have one thing in common. They saw a big drop in earnings.
Let's start with BMW. It sold five hundred and sixty
five thousand cars, down three and a half percent. Revenue
fell eight percent to thirty one billion euros.
Speaker 2: It's ebit fell a significant.
Speaker 1: Thirty six percent, and its net profit fell twenty three percent.
Speaker 2: Here's two more alarming numbers.
Speaker 1: Free cash flow fell eighty eight percent and its eves fell from seventeen percent of sales to just over fifteen percent.
Now to Daimler Truck. It sold almost six heavy rigs,
down nine percent. Revenue dropped thirteen percent to just under
ten billion euros. It's ebit plummeted seventy one percent and
its net profit fell in alarming eighty percent. And as
bad as that is, the numbers look even worse at Lucid.
It sold just over three thousand cars in the first quarter, about the same as a year ago, but down forty two percent from Q four of last year. Lucid blames
its seat supplier Camico for causing production problems which crippled sales.
It says that issue has been resolved, but the damage was already done. Lucid's revenue fell twenty percent from a
year ago and ninety five percent from the prior quarter, and it ended up losing a billion dollars over the last three months. Okay, enough of all that bad financial news.
Let's end this first segment of the show on a happier note. The US Post Office is issuing eight stamps
that celebrate the famous Roots sixty six, which originally meandered twenty four hundred miles across the country from Chicago to la The stamps show famous places along the route. Many
of you have probably heard the song get Your Kicks on Route sixty six. Everyone from the Rolling Stones to
Depeche Mode has covered it. But did you know that
it was first recorded in nineteen forty six by nat King Cole.
Speaker 2: Well, nope, neither did I.
Speaker 1: Rivian already makes a number of its own components in house, but it could become even more vertically integrated. CEO are
Jay Scorne told Reuters that the kind of advanced solid state lighter that it wants to use for the hands free driving system, the R two is really only available from Chinese companies, but buying directly from China comes with higher risk to its supply chain, like if the technology is determined to be a national security concern, so Scrin says the company is in quote active discussions to build its own light oar using Chinese technology, possibly through a joint venture, but Rivian will have to move fast. The
first light are equipped R twos are supposed to start rolling off the line late this year. R twos being
built now, which go on sale soon, are based on a quote elevated version of the Gen two architecture, similar to the one used by the current R one models, but with an improved camera and radar system. However, these
versions cannot be upgraded with the lighter in the future.
Speaker 2: Speaking of Rivian.
Speaker 1: While it's held the title since two twenty one, Amazon is no longer the ev maaker's largest shareholder. According to
a new SEC filing, the Volkswagon Group now has a nearly sixteen percent stake in Rivian, compared to about twelve percent for Amazon. It made the jump after a recent
billion dollar share investment at the end of April, and that means the VW Group has pumped three point three billion of the five point eight billion dollar commitment it made to Rivian in twenty twenty four. The two companies
recently completed winter testing of vehicles equipped with Rivian software, and the first models are expected to launch sometime next year.
Tesla is starting to see a lot of interest in its Semi trucks. Last week, the first semi rolled off
its new high volume production line near its gigafactory in Nevada, and now Tesla is receiving significant orders for the truck.
Wat Ev, which is based in California, just ordered three hundred and seventy Tesla Semis, making it the largest single EV truck deployment in the state. Tesla will deliver fifty
semis to wat Ev this year and the rest will be delivered by the end of twenty twenty seven, and more than three hundred of the trucks will be used in a joint program with the Port of Oakland. In
addition to all of that, two California port operators have ordered a combine sixty testless semis, and according to California's Clean Truck and Bus Voucher program, the testless Semi accounted for nine hundred and sixty five of the one thousand and sixty seven applications between January of twenty twenty five and February of twenty twenty six. Nissan is making big
cuts in Europe to slash costs. The automaker is planning
to close one of the two production lines at its Sunderland plant in the UK. Nissan says it's looking into
partnerships with another automaker to take over the closed line, which could end up being a Chinese automaker. The plant
currently builds the Leaf EV juke and kash Ki crossover.
In twenty twenty six, it produced more than five hundred and seven thousand vehicles, but last year that was nearly cut in half to two hundred and seventy three thousand.
In addition to this, Nissan will act nine hundred jobs across Europe, mainly white collar and warehouse workers, but not any in manufacturing. Nissan's current European headcount as around ninety
three hundred employees. Due to rising gas prices, hybrids, both
new and used, are gaining popularity in the US. According
to data firm Catalyst IQ, new hybrids were selling more quickly and had the lowest days supply. At the end
of April, advertised models spent an average of fifty nine days on dealer lots, compared with seventy five days for gasoline powered cars and one hundred and fourteen days for evs.
Hybrids also had sixty seven days supply, while gas vehicles had supplies of seventy seven days and eve's had seventy nine days.
Speaker 2: Meanwhile, in the use segment, ice.
Speaker 1: Cars reports that in the first quarter, the market share for one to five year old hybrid vehicles increased nearly forty two percent compared to a year ago. At the
same time, used ev market share was up about sixteen percent, while gas vehicle shared declined about three percent. In nineteen
thirty five, Audi set the record for fastest road racing car in the world. The Auto Union Luca, powered by
a sixteen cylinder engine, hit a top speed of nearly three hundred and twenty seven kilometers an hour, which is just over two hundred miles an hour. Now, Audi has
carefully recreated that car, stretching the almost fifteen feet of body panels over a wooden structure, which results in a vehicle that weighs less than one thousand kilograms or just over twenty one hundred pounds. Audi will unveil the new
Luca to the public later this month, and then it will go into the company's historic collection.
Speaker 2: But that's a wrap for today's show. Thanks for tuning in.
Speaker 3: Auto Line Daily is brought to you by alex Partners.
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About this episode
Quarterly results paint a rough picture for several automakers, with BMW, Daimler Truck, and Lucid all reporting steep drops in sales or profit. The segment also looks at Rivian’s push toward greater vertical integration, including possible in-house lidar development tied to Chinese technology. It wraps with a market shift toward hybrids as gas prices rise, alongside inventory comparisons showing they’re moving faster than gasoline and EV models.
- BMW Q1 Earnings Plunge Amid Falling EV Sales - Daimler Truck Profits Crater 80% In Q1 - Lucid Motors Loses $1 Billion In Q1 - USPS Celebrates Route 66 With New Stamp Series - Rivian Eyes In-House Lidar Production with Chinese Tech - VW Group Becomes Largest Shareholder in Rivian - Tesla Semi Receives Massive Orders in California - Nissan Cuts Jobs and Production Lines in Europe - Hybrid Vehicle Popularity Surges as Gas Prices Rise - Audi Recreates Record Breaking 16-Cylinder Lucca Racecar
