The episode delves into significant changes in U.S. emissions regulations as the Trump EPA repeals federal standards, creating uncertainty for automakers. Analysts discuss the first decline in electric vehicle registrations in a decade, attributed to rising prices and the expiration of tax credits. The conversation shifts to the innovative role of Agenic AI in transforming dealership operations, with insights from experts at Cox Automotive and AWS on how this advanced AI can enhance customer engagement and streamline workflows, setting new expectations for dealership interactions.
Automotive News reporter Molly Boigon talks about what the Trump EPA’s repeal of the basis for all federal emissions rules means for the industry and what happens next. Electric vehicle registrations fall for the first time in a decade. Plus, Marianne Johnson, Cox Automotive chief product officer, and David Richardson, vice president of AgentCore at Amazon Web Services, discuss how agentic artificial intelligence is transforming dealership operations beyond basic automation.
"He says the move eliminates all vehicle greenhouse gas standards starting from 2012. The move creates fresh uncertainty for automakers..."
Greenhouse gas standards are rules that tell car manufacturers how much pollution their vehicles can produce. These rules help protect the environment by reducing harmful emissions.
Greenhouse gas standards are regulations that limit the amount of greenhouse gases that vehicles can emit. These standards are crucial for reducing the environmental impact of cars and trucks, particularly in the context of climate change.
"U.S. electric vehicle registrations fell last year for the first time in at least a decade, dropping just four tenths of a percent to 1.3 million."
Electric vehicle registrations are the number of new electric cars that people have signed up to drive. It shows how popular electric cars are becoming.
Electric vehicle registrations refer to the number of new electric vehicles that are officially registered for use on the road. This metric is important for understanding the growth and adoption of electric vehicles in the market.
"That's followed Congress repealing the $7,500 EV tax credit in July. After the credit expired September 30, December registrations crashed 48 percent."
An EV tax credit is money that the government gives back to people who buy electric cars. It helps lower the overall cost of the car.
The EV tax credit is a financial incentive provided by the government to encourage the purchase of electric vehicles. It reduces the amount of tax owed by the buyer, making electric cars more affordable.
Hybrids are cars that use two types of power: a regular engine and an electric motor. This helps them use less gas and produce less pollution.
Hybrids are vehicles that use both an internal combustion engine and an electric motor to power the car. They are designed to improve fuel efficiency and reduce emissions compared to traditional gasoline-only vehicles.
"...if you go look at what Mercedes and NVIDIA have done in the investment they've made over this past year, they are changing the experience of a consumer..."
Mercedes is a well-known car brand that makes luxury vehicles. They focus on high-quality cars with advanced technology and safety features.
Mercedes-Benz is a luxury automotive brand known for its high-quality vehicles and innovative technology. The brand is recognized for its commitment to safety, performance, and luxury features.
"...if you go look at what Mercedes and NVIDIA have done in the investment they've made over this past year, they are changing the experience of a consumer..."
NVIDIA is a tech company that makes computer chips, especially for graphics. They are also working on technology for self-driving cars.
NVIDIA is a technology company primarily known for its graphics processing units (GPUs) but has also ventured into automotive technology, particularly in the development of AI and autonomous driving systems.
"...at a level four autonomy. That is going to change consumers expectations in the dealership of how you engage with me..."
Level four autonomy means that a self-driving car can drive itself without needing a human to take over in certain situations. It's a big step towards fully autonomous vehicles.
Level four autonomy refers to a stage in autonomous vehicle technology where the vehicle can handle all driving tasks in specific conditions without human intervention. It represents a significant advancement in self-driving capabilities.
"...what they need to do for recommended parts. We've made that super easy for the technician to have that voice..."
Recommended parts are the car parts that the manufacturer thinks you should replace or check regularly to keep your car running well. You can find these suggestions in the car's manual.
Recommended parts refer to components that a vehicle manufacturer suggests replacing or servicing at specific intervals to maintain optimal performance and safety. These recommendations are typically found in the vehicle's service manual.
"...to help estimate the damages on the vehicle. We put all the information..."
Estimating the damages means figuring out how much damage a car has after an accident and how much it will cost to fix it. This helps with insurance claims and planning repairs.
Estimating the damages involves assessing the extent of damage to a vehicle, typically after an accident or incident, to determine the cost of repairs. This process is crucial for insurance claims and repair planning.
"...You need new brakes. It completes the information before you create an accurate estimate."
Brakes are the parts of a car that help it slow down or stop. They need to be checked and sometimes replaced to make sure the car is safe to drive.
Brakes are a critical component of a vehicle's safety system, allowing the driver to slow down or stop the car. They typically consist of brake pads, rotors, and calipers, and require regular maintenance to ensure effective performance.
"The transition here that they're making with the Highlander moving into a BEV platform, I think their calculation here is they still want to have something in every in every segment,"
A BEV platform is a type of car design that is made just for electric cars. It helps make the best use of batteries and electric parts, making the car more efficient.
A BEV platform refers to a vehicle architecture designed specifically for battery electric vehicles (BEVs). This means the vehicle is built from the ground up to run on electric power, optimizing space for batteries and electric components.
"The transition here that they're making with the Highlander moving into a BEV platform, I think their calculation here is they still want to have something in every in every segment,"
The Toyota Highlander is a popular SUV that can carry families and their gear. It comes in different types, including ones that use electricity instead of just gasoline.
The Toyota Highlander is a midsize SUV known for its spacious interior and family-friendly features. It's available in various configurations, including hybrid and traditional gasoline models.
Select text to request an explanation
Welcome to Daily Drive. For Friday, February 13, 2026, I'm Kellan Walker in Las Vegas.
Today on the show, the Trump EPA wipes out the basis for all federal emission standards.
EV registrations fall for the first time in a decade, and vehicle inventory climbs as sales slow.
Plus, Marianne Johnson of Cox Automotive and David Richardson of AWS
joined the show to talk about how Agenic AI is changing what's possible in dealership operations.
That is going to change consumers' expectations in the dealership of how you engage with me,
how you service with me, how you sell to me. It is amplifying what's possible now.
Let's run through all the news you need to know to keep up in the auto industry.
The Trump EPA is repealing the 2009 Endangerment finding. That's the scientific determination
that greenhouse gases threaten public health. Trump calls it the single largest
deregulatory action in American history. He says the move eliminates all vehicle greenhouse gas
standards starting from 2012. The move creates fresh uncertainty for automakers who've warned
investors about climate risk while criticizing Biden-era standards. Environmental groups will
almost certainly challenge the repeal in court. A federal court already ruled January 30 that a
climate skeptic report supporting the repeal is legally dubious. We'll have more on this story
in a minute with our own Molly Boygon. U.S. electric vehicle registrations fell last year for the
first time in at least a decade, dropping just four tenths of a percent to 1.3 million. That's
followed Congress repealing the $7,500 EV tax credit in July. After the credit expired
September 30, December registrations crashed 48 percent. But analyst Tom Libby says the
slowdown actually started earlier. High prices pushed mainstream buyers toward hybrids instead
and early adopters who wanted EVs already bought them. Tesla remained dominant with a 45 percent
market share despite its registrations falling nearly 7 percent. And U.S. new vehicle inventory
dipped to 2.9 million units in January. But Lotlinks data shows that slower sales pushed
days supply up nearly a week to 77 days. Electric vehicle inventory climbed to 132 days supply
while hybrids and gas vehicles each rose by a week. All seven automakers that report monthly data
saw supply increase. Volvo jumped from 39 to 130 days after weak January sales. Toyota maintained
the industry's tightest inventory at just 29 days supply. And those are today's headlines. You can
read more about those stories and all of today's news at AutoNews.com. Automakers have been planning
around federal emissions regulations for over a decade. Now automakers are working with a completely
blank slate after the Trump administration tossed out the EPA's endangerment finding.
To help us understand what this means for the industry, let's bring in Molly Boygon who's
been covering the story. Molly, welcome back to Daily Drive. Thanks for having me, Kel.
All right, Molly. Did the auto industry want this change?
It's sort of a complicated question because the automakers were very resistant and skeptical
about their abilities to achieve the greenhouse gas emission standards that the EPA set under
the Biden administration. The industry consensus was that they were very, very challenging,
unrealistic, and there was a lot of criticism about the standards. However, the Trump administration
went a step even further saying, not only are we going to reduce the standards, we're actually going
to eliminate the standards altogether. So now there are no greenhouse gas emission standards.
And we're also going to gut the rationale that the government used to create those standards.
So that actually, according to the automaker letters that they submitted to the government,
was sort of a bridge too far because they're saying, we want consistency, we want to be able to plan.
They imply basically that it's unrealistic to expect that there will be no greenhouse
gas emission standard. And so this change is creating a lot of uncertainty for the manufacturers.
You write that a federal court already ruled in January that the climate
skeptic report supporting this repeal is legally dubious. What does that signal about the legal
challenges ahead? And how long could automakers be stuck in limbo waiting for courts to decide?
There is almost certainly going to be legal challenge to the decision to repeal the endangerment
finding. As you said, there was already a ruling last month that related to this report that the EPA
used to support its decision about repealing the endangerment finding. And a court found that
the working group that was convened to write that report convened in violation of the law. So that's
one thing. And folks are waiting to see basically if the use of that report in repealing the endangerment
finding will be found lawful. The other thing is that there have been many, many, many legal
challenges to the endangerment finding since it was established in 2009 under the Obama administration
more than 100 lawsuits. And in every one of those, it's been upheld most recently in 2012
by a DC court. So the interesting thing now is that the endangerment finding was established
related to a Supreme Court case, Massachusetts versus the EPA. There are some legal scholars and
others who are watching this to see, is the Trump administration anticipating legal challenge
and basically wanting to return this issue, whether the EPA can regulate greenhouse gas emissions to
the Supreme Court now that the Supreme Court has a conservative majority. So we'll be watching
all of the different legal challenges and watching the potential trajectory to the Supreme Court for
this case. All right, that's a lot. Check out all of Molly Boygon's reporting at AutoNews.com
because she's very good at it. Molly, thank you so much for joining me. Thanks, gal. Coming up,
Cox Automotive and AWS executives talk about how Agenic AI is going beyond answering phones
to reimagining dealership workflows. That's next on Daily Drive.
Are you a dealer creating a workplace culture your employees are proud to be part of?
Applications are now open for the 2026 automotive news best dealerships to work for program.
This isn't just an award. It's a chance to get real insight into what's working at your dealership
and where you can improve. And we've expanded the categories this year, recognizing everything
from technician experience and leadership development to AI enablement and employer
retention. The registration deadline is April 17th. Find out more and apply at AutoNews.com.
Welcome back to Daily Drive. I'm Kellan Walker.
Artificial intelligence was everywhere at this year's NADA show. But there's a new type of AI
making waves, Agenic AI, which can reason through problems and take action rather than just provide
answers. Automotive news senior retail editor Dan Shine spoke with Marianne Johnson, Cox Automotive
Chief Product Officer and David Richardson, Vice President of Agent Core at AWS. Here's their
conversation. Marianne and David, thanks you and thanks for being here and welcome to Daily Drive.
Thank you. Glad to be here. So Cox Automotive, AWS together. What's their relationship? How did
that come together? How are you working together on this? Yeah, I would say everybody knows Cox
Automotive. We've had so much of an ecosystem play for a long time. We were 80 plus acquisitions as we
came together as Cox Automotive. But in 2018, we made the decision to take everything to the cloud
and go digital native and cloud native. And AWS was the right choice for us. And we've been on
that journey. We got to the cloud pretty fast. And then we've been building ever since. And
I brag on AWS. I don't always brag on a lot of our partners. But the co-innovation,
being on the edge of where things are going, we're doing that together and doing it at scale. And
it has just been amazing. So with AI, everything that we're doing with AI, the possibilities of
what are coming to fruition right now is off the chain. And AWS is right on the front of what's
happening there as well. So how is AWS involved in dealership operations? I think people don't
know that you are, but what do you do for dealerships? We're not directly involved in
dealership operations. Instead, we work with Cox and others in the larger ecosystem and partner
with them to help them bring their deep knowledge and data and history about supporting dealers
where we can back them up through technological innovation.
Right. Okay. So it seems like NADA has a theme every year, whether the buzz of every,
and it's AI this year. Everything's AI. Every new name has a dot AI on the end of it.
And you guys are talking about agentic AI. And I think a lot of people say, wait a minute,
I'm just still kind of getting my arms around AI. Tell me about agentic AI and how that is
different than your run the mill, chat GPT AI. You want to hit that one first? Yeah. So it starts
with that. And look, this is brand new. People really only started talking about this and building
this way about a year ago. So if you think about what can that AI do? Sometimes it's just there
to give you an answer. And that's what we get with chat GPT and others. But it has an ability
to work through a problem to be able to go and act. And so what makes agents different is we're
taking advantage of that sort of reasoning and planning and working capability coupled with
tools that have existed for a long time, like back office systems. And now you put those two
together and it can solve an economic and fast way problems that before were just too brittle,
too hard to do purely through automation. Yeah, I'll add to that. But what's been possible,
and I will say reinvent the big AWS show they have every year. So reinvent a year ago, November,
maybe a year and four or five months ago, we saw agentic and we realized this is something that
is fundamentally different than chat GPT or generative. It is truly where you can give an agent
of goal, teach it, give it context, and it will learn and take action for you. And you could
really, really reimagine things differently than you ever thought before. If I want to get from
point A to point Z, you can really rethink how you do that in ways that create new customer
experiences, create new employee experiences. For me, my own personal productivity with the
agents that I've built and that I'm using inside the platforms I'm using, my productivity has lifted
up massively. I can scale myself. So then you start thinking about every function in a dealership,
every activity in a dealership. How does everybody get better? And then you go pick the workflows
or the value streams at a dealership that can really be transformed. And now we can do some
things we never could do before. For instance, like in the service department, if I wanted to
sell more batteries or sell more tires or I want to the people who have declined services in the
last 12 months, I can send out an agent. I can tell an agent, this is what I want to do. I want
you to contact all those customers and they will go off and it will do that. So there's
simple use cases and then there's complex use cases that you couldn't really make happen before,
but now you can. So an example of what you just gave, if you think about the life of the vehicle
and what is predictably going to need service, the life of that consumer and their ownership
experience, all of that data, like we have a lot of that data at Cox, you can take that data and
you can anticipate that customers needs that vehicle needs and you can be proactive rather
than reactive like you've never before done and create new experiences for your customers. I was
going to say this on stage earlier, but if you go look at what Mercedes and NVIDIA have done in
the investment they've made over this past year, they are changing the experience of a consumer
inside a car at a level four autonomy. That is going to change consumers expectations in the
dealership of how you engage with me, how you service with me, how you sell to me. It is
amplifying what's possible now in a new way in the dealership community and we are going to have
to make sure that we meet that expectation. There has to be a lot of trust, David, in this and that
you are sending something off to do a task that you are hoping and expecting that they will
perform. How do you get dealers and dealerships to kind of buy in that to trust? Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, that's right. Trust is a big factor here and I think it starts the way most new things do,
like buying trusted partners. Who are the partners who understand your business,
but who also are known and have a reputation for investing in the underpinnings of trust,
things like security, availability, scalability, data accuracy, because unless you're building
on that type of solid foundation, it's going to be really hard to achieve a trust outcome. So
start with partners. You know auto industry, it's slow to change, slow to adapt and I think
something like this can be scary for dealers and GMs and what's your advice to dealers who
know that they should be in this, but are afraid or don't know the first step? How do you get them
in and tell them that it's going to be okay? Yeah, I'll tell you a little bit of our own
story at Cox Automotive. We've been AI for a long time, but traditional AI of machine learning,
predictive analytics, and everybody's kind of got used to that. When generations have happened,
you know, there's one thing they can do right now, just get going. Our VIN solutions actually has
a general solution with our proprietary unique data that allows a consumer to be engaged in what
matters to them. Get started in something that's a simple use case, that's a high value use case.
If you're seeing 26% lift on those, get started there. Come visit us or anybody else that's doing
this and think about these are some no-brainers, no-regrets moves on some things to do. Once
you start realizing and see the benefits show up, then you got to look at, I don't care whether
you're running a large automotive group, a two rooftop, a single rooftop, any vertical, any business
has to rethink their business to stay competitive. And whether you're a Steve Rowley, the CEO,
or whether you're a family-owned business, you have to ask yourself, what are you going to do?
What is your role? And how can I do this? Well, in my opinion, doing it responsibly and finding
the human connection and how to amplify that human connection, it's that combo.
Not doing anything is not an option. It's just not an option. And there will be plenty of automotive
dealer groups and dealers that lean in and they're going to have an advantage. And so you don't want
to be in that situation where you're disadvantaged. Think about what matters most to your reputation,
your tone, your voice, and then partner to be able to make sure that what makes you special
still comes first. And what are AI agents doing in dealerships now? Are there
examples that you can give on a service side? I'll give a couple real quick. So you can come
look at our booth if you're here. One of the things we did is we took the service technician
and amplified their productivity. So we know everything on the manuals. We know what they
need to do for recommended parts. We've made that super easy for the technician to have that voice
interaction with their own assistant to level up how they're fixing the car. In our own fleet
business, as an example, we built out a fleet mate to help estimate the damages on the vehicle.
We put all the information. You need new brakes. It completes the information before you create an
accurate estimate. Took a two day process down to 30 minutes. And I'll give you a crazy story.
And this is going to, these are the kind of examples that are going to happen. We had a technician
who had some downtime. He went into our fleet mate, you know, it has our large language model
in it. And he's just asked, Hey, is there any vehicle close by that has a fire code for a trouble
code that I have the part for that I can be in 30 minutes? It showed him this vehicle at this
location just fired the code. He had the part he called the client and said, I can come get this
vehicle fixed and back on the road for you. They didn't even know they had a problem. And so the
things that can start happening are like a flywheel. So I would just encourage you to think
about any activity, virtual assistant, service technician, V auto expert in your pocket. It's
really cool. And part of what I love about these things that Cox has built is how quickly they
built them. Like these were not like, let's take two years and plan and decide on what our strategy
was like, let's learn by doing. And that that's been where the partnership has been fantastic
because the things that Cox has been trying to do have fed back into the products that we built
in Amazon Web Services and made those products better as well. And tell you a story. So in July,
the whole reference architecture of how to do this with what David was talking about with security,
with traceability, audibility, knowing that a model is performing the way it should,
the agent's not going to take an incorrect action and risk your business. That framework doesn't
exist. So we decided to take our AWS partners, their top smear from AWS, a top smear is from one
of the leading frontier model providers. And they came on site with us and we built things that you
see are in customers hands right now. We called it project Labor Day, we had working a scalable,
secure code in 60 days and put it in customers hands and our partners did alongside us. And that
whole what I call reference architecture is now where we can feel confident and want to stay on
top of it because things are changing continually of how to do this right and how to do it at scale
and know that you can go to sleep at night and say that agent's going to help my business, not hurt
my business. That's daily drive for today. I'm Kellen Walker. Thanks to automotive news executive
producer Jake Neer, as well as our own Molly Boygon, Lawrence Eyelift and Larry Belliquette for
their reporting for today's podcast. You can get the latest news on the EPA's Endangerment
Finding Repeal, Agenic AI and dealerships and everything happening in the auto industry at
AutoNews.com. Come back tomorrow for our weekend drive edition of the show where I'm joined by
Larry Belliquette and Michael Martinez as we discuss the biggest news stories of the week.
The transition here that they're making with the Highlander moving into a BEV platform,
I think their calculation here is they still want to have something in every in every segment,
including EVs. They think this will help transition some folks over and it'll pay off in the long
term. We'd love to hear from you. Let us know what you think of the show and the topics we cover
today. Send us an email at dailydrive at autonews.com or leave us a voicemail at 313 or 44 2774.
And if you enjoy the podcast, remember to like, leave a review and subscribe so you never miss an episode.
Request an explanation for:
1 cars
1 cars featured
Request an Explanation
Heard something you'd like explained? We'll add it to this episode.
Sign in to request explanations for terms you heard.
Want to learn more?
Browse our glossary for plain-English explanations of automotive terms, jargon, and concepts.
See something that's not quite right? Our annotations are AI-generated and can sometimes miss the mark.
Click the flag icon on any annotation to suggest a correction.
