Electric + Human-Powered Vehicles

[stevebrooks]

Interesting article about Nissan, car manufacturers that decided to skip or half arse the change to electric cars are suffering, as expected. In fact it's going exactly like the changeover to smartphones happened. Big phone companies that decided smartphones were a fad, either gone or just a shadow of what they were, the same will apply to car manufacturers. They needed to make that decision several years ago, now it may be to late!

https://www.news.com.au/technology/moto ... 5a2a4e3350

[stevebrooks]

The Electric Viking on Nissan's problems. If Nissan does go down it will be probably be the first of a number of manufacturers, Ford for instance mentioned in this video. Oh the brand name may not vanish, but it's highly likely someone like Byd or Cherry will take over the brand name to possibly use on EV's in the US and Australia. The sudden collapse of large traditional auto-manufacturers is almost certain...Nissan will probably be the first of many.

[stevebrooks]

The Byd Yuan UP, apparently to be sold in the US for around USD13,000, 400km driving range:

https://www.drive.com.au/news/byd-yuan- ... -revealed/

[stylofone]

Interesting article about Nissan, car manufacturers that decided to skip or half arse the change to electric cars are suffering, as expected. In fact it's going exactly like the changeover to smartphones happened. Big phone companies that decided smartphones were a fad, either gone or just a shadow of what they were, the same will apply to car manufacturers. They needed to make that decision several years ago, now it may be to late!

https://www.news.com.au/technology/moto ... 5a2a4e3350

This morning I heard a BBC program about Europe's car industry troubles. Volkswagen is closing plants in Germany for the first time. Local sales are sagging, but another reason is that the Chinese market is drying up. The Chinese used to really like the prestige of European cars, but younger buyers apparently prefer the "connectedness" of modern locally made cars. An example they gave was karaoke microphones as an accessory, which work with the in-car infotainment systems.

One imagines things like digitally-enhanced dashcam video compilations of a road trip, set to music, edited on the dashboard and uploaded directly to whatever social media network is integrated with the car's infotainment system. It's all trash IMO. I hate the "discretionary" nature of cars, I strive to limit my car use to be a practical as possible, but I don't live in the real world where people love trash with a passion.

What's more interesting is the way Europe and America are losing to China. With no car manufacturing industry in Australia, we are not on the frontline of the looming tariff war. I speculate that Chinese cars will rapidly erase the competition here over the next five years. After about 2026, this should mean that the cost of car ownership will fall because EVs will be cheaper. That might help inflation, cost of living pressures, maybe put a bit more money back into the economy. Meanwhile Europe and the USA will be slowing down the EV transition. Tariffs will put prices up and keep people in expensive, outmoded filthy ICE vehicles, while their emissions timetables fall further behind.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3ct5xj9

[stevebrooks]

Meanwhile Europe and the USA will be slowing down the EV transition. Tariffs will put prices up and keep people in expensive, outmoded filthy ICE vehicles, while their emissions timetables fall further behind.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3ct5xj9

They won't be able to, strong predictions are that battery prices are expected to fall to as low as $10kwh over the next decade at the most, maybe even within 5 years. So if you have a car with 100kwh battery, that comes to $1,000 for the battery, that's around 1 tenth the current cost, even with tariffs that's not going to work, that combined with the increasing cost of fuel, got to remember that Europe oil imports are nearly 90% of its total oil supply, dwindling demand for oil and in particular petrol and diesel in large consumer countries like China was, means prices will start to increase. Owning EV's will still be cheaper than owning ICE cars.

But that's irrelevant anyway, Europe just doesn't have the capacity to consume enough cars to keep their car industries solvent without the Chinese and other large markets like the US, which is already going to slap tariffs on European cars, with the result that their major car industries are going to collapse or be bought out by Chinese companies. The extent of the collapse when it happens is going to catastrophic and very sudden, blink and you might miss it sudden.

[stylofone]

major car industries are going to collapse or be bought out by Chinese companies. The extent of the collapse when it happens is going to catastrophic and very sudden, blink and you might miss it sudden.

I wonder which ones will collapse entirely, which ones will sell their factories at bargain-basement prices to the Chinese, which ones will have brand recognition worth retaining (like MG). Some of them are already embedded with Chinese partners/investors, e.g. Geely owns 7% of Volvo. It's going to be a buyers market. Will there be any other players besides China?

[stevebrooks]

major car industries are going to collapse or be bought out by Chinese companies. The extent of the collapse when it happens is going to catastrophic and very sudden, blink and you might miss it sudden.

I wonder which ones will collapse entirely, which ones will sell their factories at bargain-basement prices to the Chinese, which ones will have brand recognition worth retaining (like MG). Some of them are already embedded with Chinese partners/investors, e.g. Geely owns 7% of Volvo. It's going to be a buyers market. Will there be any other players besides China?

Taiwan possibly, the Kia and Hyundai brands may have invested enough in EV's already to keep them afloat. But many factories, some of VW in China and Spain have already been taken over by the Chinese. I can't see Toyota surviving, or Nissan, at least as separate companies.

[stevebrooks]

Problems at VW, 190b in debt!

[stevebrooks]

More from the Viking, prices of batteries dropping remarkably;

[stevebrooks]

Huh, tiny ute with the same space and pulling power of a much larger ute, if it actually gets to production it seems a good idea;