Technology in new cars is advancing at a faster pace than at any other point in my lifetime, and as a journalist, I have to work extra hard to keep up with everything. For regulators, this is an even more daunting challenge. Regulation is reactive and not proactive, which is true even in China, where the government is attempting to get a hold on the development of self-driving cars and the deployment of over-the-air updates.
I made an apricot bourbon ham yesterday for Easter supper, and I’m still recovering, so editor, please excuse in advance any obvious grammatical difficulties in today’s Morning Dump. You all will be rewarded for your patience with a story from an Italian website clowning on me and our resident racing driver Parker just a bit.
If there’s one company that relies on the idea of self-driving cars for its extreme valuation, it’s Tesla, so this self-driving news probably isn’t good for the automaker this morning. Almost none of the news is good for Tesla lately.
Nissan has also been an automaker visited repeatedly by the Bad News Bunny, but if you’re a fan of the automaker, you might be happy to hear that a new GT-R is on the way.
Chinese Government Warns Of Self-Driving Car Claims, Wants More Care Around OTA Updates
In some ways, the Chinese car market has become more advanced than the one here in the United States. There’s a wider range of EVs available, more battery options (including swappable ones), and more players in the intelligent driving space. A lot of this is the work of the government, which has made a concerted effort over the last two decades to be a leader in these areas.
In particular, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has provided generous incentives to companies trying to develop EVs and smarter cars that can be updated wirelessly (OTA). The government giveth, and the government taketh away.
Reports came out this weekend that the government was suddenly very concerned about all of these technologies. Here’s a concise wrap-up from CNEVPost:
China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) held a closed-door meeting with 20 companies on April 16, calling for a halt to public testing of driver assistance software and for all updates to be filed, according to a screenshot of the minutes of the meeting circulating on social media today.
Car companies were asked to refrain from using words like “self-driving,” “autonomous driving,” “smart driving,” “advanced smart driving,” and instead use the term “combined assisted driving” to avoid misleading consumers, according to the minutes of the meeting.
The MIIT wants car companies to reduce the frequency of software OTA (over the air) updates and provide them to vehicles only after sufficient verification has been completed.
This is good. All of this is good. I didn’t sign up to be a public beta tester of self-driving technology, nor did most people. Our reactive approach here in the United States is not great and is not likely to get a lot better at the federal level anytime soon. While OTA updates are a great convenience, and new cars, being more software-dependent, will likely have to be updated more frequently, that doesn’t mean there shouldn’t be extensive validation before implementation.
There’s always a push-and-pull with new technology, and it’s important that governments let new tech flourish up to the point that it becomes a societal cost. If I could go back in time, I’d probably like to have seen more work done to protect us from social media. Instead, I just tweeted a bunch.
In response to these reports, the MIIT did put out a short (Google translated) statement:
On April 16, 2025, the Equipment Industry Department of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology held a meeting to promote the product access and software online upgrade management of intelligent connected vehicles. Nearly 60 representatives from the Ministry’s Equipment Industry Development Center and major automobile manufacturers attended the meeting.
The meeting focused on the requirements for product access and online software upgrade filing in the Notice on Further Strengthening the Management of Product Access, Recall and Online Software Upgrade of Intelligent Connected Vehicles issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the State Administration for Market Regulation, and listened to the implementation and suggestions of automobile manufacturers. The Ministry’s Equipment Industry Development Center introduced the key issues of concern in the management of product access and online software upgrade of intelligent connected vehicles.
The meeting emphasized that automobile manufacturers must deeply understand the requirements of the “Notice”, fully carry out combined driving assistance testing and verification, clarify the system functional boundaries and safety response measures, and must not make exaggerations or false propaganda. They must strictly fulfill their obligation to inform, and truly assume the main responsibility for production consistency and quality safety, and truly improve the safety level of intelligent connected vehicle products.
This didn’t come out of nowhere; Chinese social media has been buzzing with info about the fatal crash of three women in a Xiaomi SU7 that was reportedly being used in self-driving mode.
All of this regulation talk sounds entirely reasonable, although this isn’t going to be good news for Tesla. The American electric car company has been lobbying China hard to allow it to roll out its “Full Self-Driving” technology to more users in the country. As a camera-based system, Tesla needs a lot of data to be successful. The longer it has to wait, the further ahead rivals might get.
Tesla Bulls, Analysts Downgrade Company
The stated goal of Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (or DOGE) is to slash unnecessary waste in federal funding. By Musk’s own admission, this effort will fall short and has, seemingly, created more confusion and trauma than increased efficiency in any obvious way. What Musk has done quite efficiently with DOGE is make his once-popular car company extremely unpopular with a lot of potential buyers.
According to Cox Automotive’s monthly EV Market Monitor, Tesla took another hit last month:
In March, the volume of new electric vehicle (EV) sales increased by 18.5% month over month to 107,594 units, although the EV market share dropped to 6.8%. Year over year, the new EV sales volume increased by 8.2%. Tesla’s market share fell by 5 percentage points to 42%, although the Model Y and Model 3 remained the top-selling vehicles. It was a strong month for Chevrolet, Hyundai, Genesis and Cadillac, with each brand experiencing a month-over-month volume increase of 50% or more.
Fearing tariff-related disruptions, a bunch of people went out and bought cars. With a falling market share, this means that fewer people are choosing Tesla as their choice for an EV than in the past.
Wells Fargo’s auto analysts think lower deliveries this quarter will also coincide with lower margins, and they’ve set a price target of $130 per share. This is a lot lower than the $227 per share the stock was sitting at this morning. That’s Wells Fargo; let’s check in on permabull Dan Ives from Wedbush Securities, via this report from Bloomberg:
Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives said Elon Musk should step back from his controversial work at the Department of Government Efficiency and re-focus his attention on Tesla Inc., adding the electric-vehicle maker faces a “code red” moment as it prepares to report first-quarter earnings Tuesday.
“Musk needs to leave the government, take a major step back on DOGE, and get back to being CEO of Tesla full-time,” Ives wrote in a report to clients Sunday. “Tesla is Musk and Musk is Tesla….and anyone that thinks the brand damage Musk has inflicted is not a real thing, spend some time speaking to car buyers in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. You will think differently after those discussions.”
Damn, Ives called a “Code Red” and downgraded his rosy stock estimates based on the idea that the company is not focused on delivering cars/tech and instead focused on too many other things The little issue of reports about a lawsuit involving Tesla allegedly speeding up odometers on cars to avoid warranty repairs can’t help, either. It’s a bad news week for Tesla, and it hasn’t even had its earnings call yet, which will be tomorrow after markets close.
New Nissan GT-R Coming, Eventually, In Hybrid Form
If there’s any sports car that should be a hybrid, it’s the Nissan GT-R. The company has always used the halo vehicle as a tech-forward supercar killer (many called the R35 a computer-on-wheels when it came out), utilizing AWD and turbocharging well before most of the competition.
The R35 generation is taking its bows with no immediate successor ready to be revealed, but the faithful won’t have to wait that long, according to Nissan Americas boss Ponz Pandikuthira in an interview with The Drive:
“We are going to have a certain level of electrification there,” Pandikuthira said. The executive said, “solid-state batteries will be the key enabler to make that happen.”
The reason is heat management and energy density.
Pandikuthira made cases for the next GT-R being either a hybrid or a plug-in hybrid. The decision isn’t locked due to the unknowns with tomorrow’s battery tech, but he likes the idea of a plug-in hybrid. With today’s tech, though, a conventional hybrid makes more sense on a track.
A conventional hybrid Nissan GT-R with a solid-state battery sounds awesome.
Parker And I Getting Stuck In A Fiat Makes The Italian News
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Just in case you missed it, one of the highlights (lowlights?) of the New York Auto Show was when Parker and I almost immediately got ourselves trapped in a Fiat Topolino. It took longer than I care to admit to figure it out, and while someone walking around could have gotten us out, I did feel too embarrassed to ask for help. It was funny so we blogged about it, as one does.
The Italian car site ClubAlfa also thought it was worthy of a post, writing:
The two journalists, Thomas and Parker, attracted by the compact and original silhouette of the small Italian vehicle, decided to get inside to better observe the Topolino’s interior. However, once inside, they were surprised to find they couldn’t get out.
Hah! Thomas? He wasn’t even there, though I’m happy to let him take the blame.
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
In honor of ingesting probably too many Rice Krispies treats this weekend, here are Talking Heads with “Sugar on My Tongue.”
The Big Question
Do Chinese regulators have the right idea about self-driving cars?
Top photo: BYD
Wow, that Topolino looks so much like a Citroen Ami, at least in that photo. Glad you escaped its clutches Matt. 🙂
I’ll say yes to the self driving/ota update stuff. Which is really sad how far behind we are on regulating a lot of newer technologies. I guess stuff gets stuck in the tubes and here we are trying to back it up like a dump truck.
I think this odometer story might be a real coffin nail for Tesla. If the “Algorithm” that adjusts mileage only ever increases it rather than decreasing for some drivers to make an equal overall average, then the intent seems obvious and fraudulent. Musky has always liked to play wink wink games with margins, semantics, and estimates. Something akin to “Yeah I made a huge promise, but I phrased or qualified it with this little escape clause, so haha” kind of stuff. But this one looks like plain book cooking. That book being warranty claims. If this is real, it seems like it must have been intentional and I don’t see any valid excuses.
How many Teslastans can you realistically get on a civil jury? Probably not enough. If this what I suspect and can make it our of arbitration to a real court, this should be a BFD.
The DOJ and NTSB should be all over this, but DOGE just canned the NTSB folks that should be looking into this, and this really isn’t the forum for evaluating the DOJ.
I’ll just say it probably won’t turn into the scale of corporate malfeasance story that it should turn into.
There will undoubtedly be more civil suits, but I’m guessing the government treats it as a big nothing burger.
Yep, that’s why I only mentioned the civil potential, as I expect nothing but defenses of Tesla by what few ‘regulators’ might be left.
My new boss asked me if I’d ever done work for Chinese EV companies (being involved in EV manufacturing for a number of years, now).
I replied: “no, I hadn’t” as China had been behind everyone. Until they weren’t. Impressive stuff.
What’s next?
What I’m listening too
It’s rare that a song with a similar title as a Talking Heads song can outweird them, but System of a Down did. Check out SUGAR by SOAD
https://youtu.be/5vBGOrI6yBk
Elon just needs to leave. Period. End of sentence.
DOGE has been a disaster that will end up costing taxpayers more in the long run, and that’s not even taking into account the pain and suffering imposed on the government workers directly affected by DOGE’s gross incompetence. There’s going to be a very long tail with all of that.
As for Tesla, his vanity project Cybertruck is an abject failure (not only are they sitting on $200M in unsellable inventory, they have to recoup $900M in costs associated with the production facilities, according to an article I just read), we’re still years away from legitimate self driving technology (and when we get it, it won’t be with a camera only sensor suite), and his own board of lackeys/directors counselled him against the Robotaxi concept. To me the $130 stock price target seems a bit generous.
SpaceX is doing well as a company, but there’s an argument to be made it’s because he’s left it alone lately (though how much of that has to do with his drug use & China connections vs military/government pressures to stay away, I don’t know).
He came here under false pretense (student visa, but quit school to play in venture capital) so based on what they’re doing with others right now, there’s sufficient grounds for him to be expelled. Not that that’s actually going to happen – all he’d need to do is drop $5M on one of those Gold Cards and he’d be right back in, and that’s probably less than a month’s worth of child support anyway.
Guess I ate too much for Easter. Sorry.
Elon needs to be strapped to the inside of a rocket nozzle of the next Falcon launch.
Two quick things about Musk that occurred to me over the weekend:
Instead, he’s sitting around f*cking himself, his investors, his employees, and a bunch of government employees at the same time. And also kids with measles and malaria in the developing world.
Yeah, I guess the US is bumping its way back down to the developing world, isn’t it?
https://arstechnica.com/health/2025/04/each-measles-case-in-raging-outbreak-costs-up-to-50000-cdc-official-says/
Part of the measles blame needs to be shared by the parents who did not vaccinate their children. 96% of cases unvaccinated per CDC.
…and CDC will soon stop keeping and publishing statistics…
“If we just stop testing people COVID numbers will go down”
The old ‘out of site, out of mind’….sad that we’re allowing anti-science policies to prosper.
I still can’t get over the quote from one of the moms of “It wasn’t too bad, they got over it quickly”…. for her other 4 children after one DIED of measles.
Thats gonna stick with me for a while
“Tesla Bulls, Analysts Downgrade Company”
Presumably you meant Bears, as Bulls are long/optimistic on a company.
His point is even the perennial optimists are downgrading the price targets. It wouldnt be news if traditional bears were further downgrading price targets.
Oops, misread permabull there.
I know that I’m old because I just can’t understand the self driving “Manhattan Project”. I love driving as it’s one of life’s moving experiences. I understand some people don’t see it that way and find driving a chore. What is sooo important that you can’t drive from A to B? Watch a movie? Put on makeup or trim your beard? Take an Uber .I’m sorry, I just do not get it. But it’s Okay. Soon, me and my kind will be gone.
I love driving, but I love sleep a lot more.
As they say ” you can sleep when you’re dead”.
You can combine the two with self-driving cars.
Stay on the road long enough with FSD running, and you will be dead.
I don’t see the appeal of self driving for short trips, but it would be great for long distance travel. It would be nice to be able to go to sleep at night and wake up at your destination, or at least a few hundred miles closer to it.
The only downside is that you would have to be careful typing in the address. It would suck to wake up in Manhattan, Kansas when you thought you were going to New York City.
Great observation. I believe they already have that technology. I call it aircraft.
Thanks to everyone for their reply.
People are already doing those things without self-driving so I’d definitely rather them have that feature available.
I rarely see people driving from the back seat. Thanks, again!
100% yes, Chinese regulators have the right idea for “self-driving” cars. Given the confusion about the true abilities of Tesla Autopilot and other L2 driver assistance systems, this seems long overdue. A lot of less informed people have the idea that some of these cars (cough, *Tesla*, cough) really are self-driving. I pop those bubbles all the time.
Yep, my gauge for when a car is truly “self driving” is when the manufacturer is liable in an accident. Until that point, it’s just a driver aid…
My guess is that when there are a billion people, some of them will get run over by a car operated both without a driver and with the approval of the government.
I feel like there is some kind of lesson to take away when China pours huge amounts of money into its tech focused auto industry, controls the media narratives, and still says “let’s cool it with the self driving stuff”.
This is the correct take.
Right? Notable country that’s super fond of human rights *checks notes* CHINA thinks that the safety of its citizens is more important than corporate profits but the US does not. Hmmm.
“Do Chinese regulators have the right idea about self-driving cars?”
Yes.
Still getting used to being shown up by the “bad guys.”
There’s also the added confusion about the communists being the free global trade advocates now and the ‘land of the free’ imprisoning dissenters
It all gives me “Are we the baddies?” vibes.