Good morning! It’s Friday, March 1, 2024, and this is The Morning Shift, your daily roundup of the top automotive headlines from around the world, in one place. Here are the important stories you need to know.
1st Gear: Research Needed To Prepare Firefighters For EV Blazes
Cars burst into flames all the time and, at least when it comes to gas-powered blazes, firefighters across America have become pretty efficient at putting them out and rescuing anyone caught inside. The switch to electric cars has, however, posed an all new challenge for America’s fire departments.
According to a report from Automotive News, lawmakers in the U.S have called for more research into the threat EV fires pose to drivers across America. This includes working to give fire departments across the country better training and equipment to prepare them to tackle such blazes. According to the site:
“Over many decades, we’ve developed best practices to extinguish internal combustion engine fires as safely and quickly as possible. Now, we need to give that level of attention and support to research into electric vehicles, and specifically into the lithium ion batteries that power them,” Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., said in an opening statement.
Lofgren cited a 2020 report from the National Transportation Safety Board that found U.S. fire departments were ill-equipped to handle EV battery fires. The report also found inadequacies in the guidance automakers provide to emergency personnel responding to the fires.
“In the years since that report was published, EV sales have ballooned, from 300,000 in 2020 to 1.3 million in 2023,” she said. “However, the data available on EV fires hasn’t increased proportionally. Fire departments across the country — many staffed by volunteers — lack the resources to track the EV fires they extinguish.”
During a hearing of U.S policymakers on the matter, experts warned that EV fires could become much more common as the popularity of battery-powered cars rises. As a result, a California fire chief called on stronger legislation to ensure automakers are making their EVs as safe as can be.
Dan Munsey, fire chief at the San Bernardino County Fire Department in California, also called for better funding for fire departments across America so they can be better prepared to fight blazes when they do occur.
2nd Gear: Fisker Is In Trouble
It’s a tough time to be an electric vehicle startup, as brands like Lucid and Rivian are slashing production goals left, right and center. Now, EV startup Fisker is facing troubles of its own after the rollout of its Ocean electric SUV was hit with issues.
The electric vehicle maker is now watching in horror as its share price plunges, and it was even warned that it “might not be able to continue,” according to a report from Reuters. The site explains:
Fisker said it would cut its workforce by about 15% and added it was in talks with a large automaker for a potential investment and joint development partnership. It did not disclose the name of the automaker or financials of the potential deal.
The company has struggled to sell its flagship Ocean electric SUV after high interest rates have led to a slowdown in demand. Current resources were “insufficient” to cover the next 12 months, Fisker said. In addition to talks with the large automaker, Fisker said it was in talks with a debt holder about a potential investment. Fisker said it aims to deliver between 20,000 and 22,000 Ocean vehicles in 2024. Without additional financing, the company said it might be forced to reduce production of Ocean, decrease investments, scale back operations and cut jobs further.
Company CEO Henrik Fisker said that 2023 was a “challenging year” for the brand, according to Reuters. Over the course of the 12 month period, the automaker was hit with production delays, supply issues and a raft of mixed reviews to the launch of its Ocean electric SUV. As a result, the company made fewer than a quarter of the more than 40,000 vehicles that it projected, and delivered less than 5,000 of the cars that it completed.
To try to ramp up deliveries, the automaker has signed up with 13 dealers across America in the hope that having a network of bricks and mortar retailers across the country will help it begin shifting cars in real numbers.
3rd Gear: Lordstown Is Still In Trouble
While Fisker is hitting rough waters for the first time, one automaker that has consistently been plagued with disaster along its mission to launch electric pickup trucks is Lordstown Motors. Now, the struggling startup finds itself out of the frying pan and into the fire as it’s hit with a $26 million bill following a Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) probe.
According to a report from Bloomberg, Lordstown Motors has been ordered to pay $25.5 million to settle an SEC inquiry into allegations that it “exaggerated” the demand for its Endurance pickup truck. As Bloomberg reports:
The automaker made misleading statements about its pre-orders for the truck, called the Endurance, and misrepresented how quickly it could deliver the trucks, according to the SEC. The firm rose to prominence after former US President Donald Trump hailed it for saving auto-maker jobs.
“In a highly competitive race to deliver the first mass-produced electric pickup truck to the U.S. market, Lordstown oversold true demand for the Endurance,” Mark Cave, an associate director of enforcement at the SEC, said in a statement.
Paying the hefty fine will be a big ask for the cursed automaker, which actually filed for bankruptcy in June 2023 and sold the lasy of its assets to company founder Steve Burns later that year. So instead of coughing up the cash, the SEC says the fine will be “deemed satisfied” once Lordstown has finished paying off two class-action lawsuits it agreed to settle.
Those lawsuits relate to allegations that the company “made misrepresentations or failed to disclose material facts” between August 2020 and March 2021.
4th Gear: VW And XPeng Are Working On An SUV
One final bit of electric vehicle news for today comes from German automaker VW, which has partnered up with Chinese automaker XPeng to jointly develop a new all-electric SUV. The tie up between VW and the Chinese company was announced last year, when the German automaker outlined its ambitions to offer more affordable models in China.
Now, Reuters is reporting that the first of that more budget-friendly offering could be a battery-powered SUV made in collaboration between VW and XPeng. As Reuters explains:
Under a “master agreement” for platform and software collaboration, the automakers in a statement said they will start a joint sourcing program for platform and vehicle parts used by both partners, leveraging scale to reduce cost.
The announcement marks a step forward in a partnership forged in July when Volkswagen said it would buy 4.99% of Xpeng for around $700 million with plans to jointly launch two EV models by 2026. The purchase was completed in December.
According to Reuters, any vehicles produced as part of the partnership between the two companies will all be badged as VW cars. The cars will be based on an older EV platform before VW embarks on the launch of a new, cheaper EV platform based on its MEB platform that underpins models like the ID.3 and even the ID.Buzz electric van.