Automobile

Bloomberg French new car registrations soared 569% in April to 140,428 vehicles, rebounding from a year earlier when the coronavirus pandemic shut showrooms and auto factories. Registrations fall 25% compared with April 2019, showing that the vehicle market hasn’t yet recovered to pre-Covid levels, the CCFA association of carmakers said in a statement. The same trend was evident in the …

Bloomberg BMW AG’s China joint-venture (JV) with Great Wall Motor Co. is set to start production in 2023, as the German carmaker aims to have electric vehicles make up one-quarter of its sales in the country. The construction of a manufacturing plant with Great Wall is “well under way” and the main structure should be completed later this year, BMW’s China …

Bloomberg Mitsubishi Motors Corp will cut production by as many as 16,000 cars globally next month due to the chip shortage, according to a company spokesperson, latest automaker to succumb to the malaise that’s gripped the world’s automobile industry. The Japanese automaker produced 90,745 units globally in January and 88,754 cars in February, according to its website, so that trim …

Bloomberg Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co. is considering raising about $1 billion to help expand its iconic British sports and racing automotive business Lotus Cars into the electric vehicles market in China. Geely is working with advisers to sound out potential investor interest in a funding round that could value Lotus’s EV operations at about $5 billion, the people said. …

Bloomberg Hyundai Motor Co. is pitching its new Ioniq 5 as being able to do more than the average EV. In a series of promotional videos on YouTube, a camper is shown running on a treadmill hooked up to the car’s battery, listening to their favourite tunes on a bank of speakers, and even rustling up a roast-chicken dinner in …

Bloomberg Nate Calabrese almost skipped right over the “driver wanted” ad on job-search website Indeed.com because it offered so few details. Turned out the posting was for the Boring Co., the tunneling business owned by Elon Musk. That’s how Calabrese, 27, ended up driving people underneath the Las Vegas convention center in one of the first public peeks at the …

Bloomberg Xiaomi Corp. unveiled plans to invest about $10 billion over the next decade on manufacturing electric cars, embarking on its biggest-ever overhaul to enter China’s booming EV market. Billionaire co-founder Lei Jun announced his intention to lead a new standalone division and spearhead the smartphone giant’s drive into vast but unfamiliar territory, in what he called his final major …

Bloomberg Toyota Motor Corp’s first-quarter sales surged 22% from a year earlier in North America, signaling a healthy recovery from when Covid-19 shutdowns kept car buyers at home. Sales rise to 603,066 vehicles in the quarter, the Japanese automaker said. March sales jumped a gaudy 87% to almost 254,000, Toyota said in separate release, but that compares with a month …

Bloomberg Tesla Inc. delivered more cars than expected in the first quarter, a strong start to a year in which Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk will be scaling global operations and building two more factories. The maker of electric vehicles delivered 184,800 cars worldwide in the first three months of the year, up from 180,570 in the fourth quarter, the …

Bloomberg Mercedes-Benz is about to unveil a new flagship model it expects to boast market-leading battery range, following through on its pledge to compete in the luxury electric-vehicle segment with top technology. The April 15 debut of the EQS — the first Mercedes built on dedicated electric-car underpinnings — will mark a milestone for the German brand that’s been criticised …