There’s a quote attributed to Japanese Admiral Yamamoto at the end of the film “Tora, Tora, Tora” wherein, following the attack on Pearl Harbor, he mourns what is to come by saying “I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.” He was talking about America and he was absolutely right (even if he probably only wrote it). Is General Motors a sleeping giant, finally filled with a terrible resolve? It’s a question I’m pondering this morning as we look at a mix of news from the automaker.
Plus, an update for BMW owners and a little tease of Chrysler’s future.
GM Revises 2023 Income Forecasts Up
Who, in this scenario, would be the Japanese? Arguably Tesla, which has ignited a price war with the world and already put automakers on notice by proving electric cars could be both marketable and extremely profitable. GM had a lead in EVs and didn’t really leverage it to its fullest potential because GM, much like pre-WWII America, was mired in complacency.
No more. General Motors is moving fast to be the automaker of the future and, in spite of numerous legacy problems at the automaker, is big enough not to ignore. To paraphrase former President Bill Clinton: There’s nothing wrong with GM that can’t be fixed by what’s right at GM. Specifically, GM has some of (if not the) best engineers in the world. [Editor’s Note: I consider GM to have the most engineering talent of any automaker on earth, bar none. Yes, none. When GM puts its mind to something — specifically a product with a narrow focus and not some watered down crossover that has to be everything to everyone — it can build world-beaters like the Camaro ZL1 and C6 Corvette. We’ve seen it time and again; GM can out-engineer everyone if it can aim its resolve in one clearly-defined direction. -DT].
After years of automakers telling us they planned to make less money, quarter after quarter, it’s newsworthy to see upward revisions. Here’s GM CEO Mary Barra’s letter to shareholders:
Once again, we delivered strong earnings thanks to healthy customer demand for our vehicles, our intense focus on operational excellence, and great teamwork between GM, our dealers, our suppliers and our unions. I want to thank everyone for their efforts.
Great examples include the way the GMI team has pivoted from restructuring the business to earning record profits, excluding China. It’s exciting to see early orders for the new Chevrolet Trax in Korea and the Chevrolet Montana in Brazil come in at a record pace.
In the U.S. market, we led the industry in retail and fleet deliveries, commercial deliveries and truck sales. We also earned the largest year-over-year increase in market share of any automaker with strong production and inventory discipline, and consistent pricing.
In addition, we delivered more than 20,000 EVs, thanks to the third consecutive quarter of record Chevrolet Bolt EV and Bolt EUV deliveries and rising Cadillac LYRIQ sales. We are now #2 in the U.S. market, and we increased our EV market share by 8 percentage points.
As we look at the performance of the business and the opportunities ahead of us, we’re able to raise our full-year 2023 earnings guidance to a range of $11 billion – $13 billion.
Ok, let’s break this out:
- “excluding China” – We’ve touched on this already, but China is currently a disaster for foreign automakers. GM’s Q1 2023 “China equity income” dropped 65% to just $83 million, compared to 234 million in Q1 2022. Still, the rest of the world is looking alright.
- “Restructuring the business” – The company offered buyout packages to basically everyone worked there and 5,000 employees accepted. Assume most of those positions will not be filled.
- “In the U.S. market” – America’s back baby!
- “third consecutive quarter of record Chevrolet Bolt EV and Bolt EUV ” – Ahh… hmmm.
A General Motors with more money to invest and an actual plan is something to behold, possibly. Buckle up.
GM Recalls 40,000 HD Silverados Over Risk Of Fires
If you own a big ol’ Chevy work truck (4500HD, 5500HD, 6500HD) built between 2019 and 2023 you might wanna check and see if you are part of a recall. Here’s the skinny on the wide trucks, from The Washington Post via The Detroit News:
The issue is tied to the vehicle’s brake pressure sensor assembly, which could allow brake fluid to leak into the brake pressure switch and cause an electrical short-circuit. That in turn could overheat the circuit, creating a fire risk whether the vehicle is being driven or parked.
Chevrolet dealers are to replace the cylinder pressure sensor and inspect the wire harness, replacing it if necessary. Any replacements should occur free of charge, the federal agency said.
That’s not terrible as far as recalls go. We’ve seen much worse.
Chrysler’s New Big Sedan Will Be An EV
Credit to Chrysler for stretching the Chrysler 300 from 2005 to this year, which is a long time (I graduated college in 2005, so it feels extra long). What will replace it? Who better to go inside Mopar than the folks at Mopar Insiders, who filed this juicy report:
At its recent dealer meeting in Las Vegas, Stellantis presented a preview of its upcoming products to its dealers in a secure, electronics-free environment. Among the products showcased was a new electric sedan from Chrysler.
According to several dealer sources, the upcoming Chrysler electric sedan resembles the images teased during Stellantis’ EV Day 2021 presentation. The presentation featured silhouettes of a sleek, fastback coupe-like sedan with Chrysler logos on the wheels.
Who knows how accurate this image from the Stellantis EV Day 2021 presentation is, but it’s an interesting thought. The fastback-y sedan is the general shape of all of these EVs and it makes sense to see the company leaning on its heritage. Chrysler is the farthest behind of all domestic U.S. legacy brands in terms of electrifications, though it’s the leader in plug-in hybrids thanks to the Jeep Wrangler.
If You’ve Got An Android Phone And A Newer BMW You Can Now Use Your Android Phone As A Key
Android users have it tough. They’re the green bubbles. The ruiner of text groups. Even worse, Android users don’t buy apps or subscriptions in the same way Apple users do, so they’re often last to new apps and technology. Rejoice, however, as BMW’s Digital Key Plus is now available on Android phones.
Just as a reminder of what this technology is, from BMW:
A smartphone with Digital Key Plus completely replaces the vehicle key with extended functionality made possible using ultra-wideband technology (UWB). This is a digital radio technology for close range with high bandwidth, which features very precise localisation with the maximum possible security. The precision of UWB also ensures that the risk of relay attacks, where the radio signal is jammed or intercepted, is virtually eliminated. The BMW Group worked in collaboration with key partners like Google to develop the corresponding specification with partners and established it as a global standard for the automotive industry via the Car Connectivity Consortium (CCC). The CCC is the global driving force for vehicle connectivity for all smart mobile devices.
The kicker here, of course, is that this same technology has been available on Apple phones since 2021. Poor green bubbles.
Your Turn
Is General Motors the automaker of the future or are they never gonna get it together?
Photos: GM, BMW, Stellantis
Regarding Chrysler… I’ve read elsewhere that the new electric sedan will be the next gen Chrysler 300. And apparently the Dodge version will be called the Charger Daytona.
Regarding GM: It’s too early to say. If the Ultium-based vehicles that are coming are good, reliable and durable, then GM has a future. If not, then they are in serious trouble. The Ultium platform and the vehicles on it is the most important investment GM has made in decades. It’s comparable in importance to GM coming out with the original SBC V8 and hydromatic automatic transmission back in the 1950s.
Like the Lunar Rover, engineered and built by GM under contract for Boeing. It was the most advanced wheeled vehicle by far anywhere in the Solar System in its day, at a time GM was mass-producing cars still mostly based on 1940s technology.
So GENERAL Motors is good at SPECIFIC engineering briefs?
*scratches head…
Open your car with your phone or NFC card?….whatever. I want to open my car with the NFT I bought with Bitcoin….and I’m willing to pay a subscription to do so….because blockchain!
I want my car to have an AI that knows when I want to get in.
Don’t give Elon any ideas
This is SO classic GM – they love a “Great Leap Forward” where they put all their chips on one color or perhaps even one number as they play customer demand roulette. They did this when every GM vehicle* was downsized, and again when every vehicle was made FWD*. Now it’s full
steamamperage ahead on electric vehicles!Three quotes from different sources here.
First GM’s Ms. Barra:
Now Statsia:
In 2022, the auto industry in the United States sold approximately 13.75 million light vehicle units. This figure includes retail sales of about 2.9 million passenger cars and just under 10.9 million light trucks.
Now Fortune Magazine:
So, 20,000 EV’s ( which made GM #2 in the U.S. market), out of 13.7 million vehicles sold- so NATURALLY that’s a sign to jump in that market with both feet!
*Of course, “every” is hyperboyle, but you get the point
One thing I haven’t heard mentioned in all this talk about China turning up their collective noses at foreign automakers is that it will probably be the death of Buick. The only reason it survived the 2008 purge was China, and if that goes away it doesn’t seem like there’s enough domestic presence to keep it going. Which is a shame because I actually like a lot of what Buick has done since then, but with the lack of brand awareness (at least in a positive sense) in the US I don’t see how it continues without China to prop it up.
GM the company just like GM the cars “will run badly, forever”
GM will be fine. They’re coming out with their trucks that are designed to be EV’s from the ground up. They have their commercial EV business. If they wait a little on passenger vehicles that won’t be the end of the world.
The Bolt being zapped is a positive for them. They can use the factory to do Ultium vehicles like the rest of their planned lineup. Then they won’t be stuck with an early EV architecture that doesn’t fit with the rest of their platform. We’ll see incentives on those Equinox EV’s soon enough.
GM is, was, and will likely continue to be the automaker of the present. It should be a relatively safe place to be, if not for unforced errors on their part. But playing it safe allows them to weather those errors and keep going (usually–the occasional government bailout does the rest of the work in keeping them going).
The Bolt was an EV of its time, and they have cut it from the lineup to keep in the present. The Ultium platform is offering nothing particularly groundbreaking or ahead of the pack, but it’s not falling behind. They aren’t the automaker of the future, but they’ll probably be the automaker of the present in the future.
It’s still weird, though, to brag about record Bolt sales when you have decided to stop selling it. I get that it is for “reasons,” but still…
Our 2021 330e lets us use our Android phone as a key, so I don’t think this is a new feature. It was an optional feature on our car, so maybe it’s standard now or wasn’t on all models. It’s so darn handy, because I’m often outside and just need to move the car or grab something and I don’t have the key in my pocket. It also came with a credit card size NFC card that does the same thing.
Also Handy for hacking into and stealing your car I suppose.
I worry more about my RAM 1500 getting stolen at this point, and they don’t have this feature. The Stellantis products seem too easy to hack right now. They are getting a lot of Chargers and Challengers, but a percentage seem to be RAM’s too.
22 M235i also have the Android ability as well as the “carbon fiber” look credit card key. For me that is akin to the magnet box under the car with a spare key, lol
“excluding China” – We’ve touched on this already, but China is currently a disaster for foreign automakers.
This was as predictable as it was inevitable. In the interests of short term profits companies went into China, gave up equity stakes, and transferred technology that is now being used to effectively boot them out of the country. The Chinese are smart and know exactly how to take advantage of Western greed and complacency to play the long game and achieve their goals.
I kind of miss AMC. They were more of a “make do” company than a class leader, but they delivered largely competent vehicles that average folk could afford to own and drive. And some even had pizzazz.
GM, Ford and Stellantis have, increasingly, abandoned the lower end of the market. AMC kept the Big Three honest with regard to stirring competition in the down-market segment. Plus, Jeep, the most American vehicle ever. No U.S. company has that role anymore and I think the domestic market is poorer for it.
The design-on-a-shoestring approach (and disastrous alliance – no pun intended – with Renault) ultimately killed AMC, I suppose, but I think it’s too bad the mantle of decent, affordable transportation was allowed fall to mostly foreign producers. We’re headed toward another financial crisis (or adjustment, take your pick) and none of the domestic carmakers are positioned for it, leaving us ripe for Chinese, or perhaps Indian, dominance in the cheap car segment.
GM’s abandoning the Bolt, despite robust sales numbers that pushed it into a position second only to Tesla in the domestic EV market is just the most recent example of upward product creep. Hate to see U.S. companies make a similar mistake to the one they made during the fuel crisis years of the 70s. That’s my rant for today.
The “lower end of the market” no longer buys subcompact or compact cars. They buy Denali Acadias and F150 King Ranch. GM, Ford, and Stellantis are not abandoning them, they are following them.
No, they don’t. Lower end of the market buys Hyundais, KIAs, and Toyotas. There’s a difference between the lower end of the market and the OEMs abandoning them to chase buyers who give them the most profit per vehicle.
‘I’ll take financially strapped car buyers for 400 Alex….’
My anecdotal observation is that the low end of the market buys purely on payment amount, and the brand and even body type is secondary.
I meant, the lower end of GM and Ford customers. They both offered down market models and they just didn’t sell in volumes. Previous customers were buying up into better models. So GM and Ford followed. Kia and Hundai are different animals, budget brands across the board. although they are trying to shake that image.
I see so many Foci and Fusions on the road though, very few EcoSports or whatever that POS is called.
The lower end of the market is trying to buy Ford Mavericks, but Ford won’t make them fast enough, and dealers won’t order the low-spec hybrid models, or sell them at MSRP without absurd add-ons.
Kia and Hyundai (and Nissan) would be in deep trouble if Ford had accurately predicted Maverick Hybrid demand and prepared for it appropriately.
you probably have to think of it more in terms of the powersports segment. Even Harley has tried the build them in India and now possibly China and the price will make the US consumer purchase them. this has never really worked but I suppose the kid sized ATV’s and motorcycles with Chinese names or even established names on Chinese built units has become and acceptable thing. it seems exceedingly hard to turn a profit when the US built stuff is coming from people barely able to get up each day, but seem to expect a 6 figure salary.
I’m curious about these “use your phone as the key” functions and the mechanics of how they work.
Is it wholly passive? As in, you walk up to the car, phone in your pocket or bag, and the phone communicates with the car on its own to unlock the door and start the ignition? Or does it necessitate more user involvement by requiring the user to open an app, select “unlock”, or even hold the phone close to the car like an NFC reader?
If it is the former, then that sounds like a great feature — very similar to the proximity keys that cars have had for years, but it means that there’s one less thing you have to carry around. If it’s the latter, it still sounds like a nice feature, but one that would be better as a backup just in case you happen to lose your proximity keyfob.
I watched a guy in a Tesla next to me trying to fumble with his phone in direct afternoon sunlight to get his trunk and doors open (door for kid, trunk for groceries).
I had my Mini filled and left by the time he got both open. I wasn’t impressed.
It’s passive… almost like an NFC. The key actively unlocks the car when I approach and locks when I walk away. When using my phone I have to hold it about an inch from the door handle to unlock and have to hold it there again to lock the car. There’s a pad inside the car where you have to set the phone to start the car. I don’t have to unlock my phone to unlock the car, but I think you can set it up to require a phone unlock.
Is that a big market? BMW owners (or leasers) who have Android phones?
The CCC was also the Civilian Conservation Corps, a jobs and public works program that was stood up as part of FDR’s New Deal. It ran from 1933 until 1942, when the US got involved in WWII.
Does Chevrolet make a profit on the Bolt EUV? It would make sense to cancel it if it was intended to be a loss leader to generate interest in future EVs. If it is profitable, it seems odd to cancel it before the Equinox EV is ready. Chevrolet’s website says the Equinox EV will be available fall 2023, but I’m skeptical since they don’t give a lot of details and you can’t reserve one yet.
Sure, GM has engineering talent, but their actual business model is a 3-legged stool of:
1) patriotism
2) implicit taxpayer financial guarantees (AKA Too Big to Fail)
3) the chicken tax
And as long as so many of the models are built overseas the workers of America are getting the short end of the stick. GM and the other offenders here all want to have their cake and eat it too. Fuck that. I don’t want to buy shit from certain countries just because some douchebag thinks it’s cost effective.
General Motors has some of the most amazing engineering talent chained to the worse product management I’ve ever seen. Engineering routinely produces a goose that lays golden eggs, and all pm does is scheme to cook it. Add to that the legacy mindset on software and the dealer network and… nope. Perhaps the automaker of a dystopian future?
Exactly this.
We could have had inexpensive 200 mile range electric sedans in the late 1990s from them, but the guys at the top of the company were overtly hostile to the idea. GM sold its share of ECD/Cobasys to Chevron, which shelved the NiMH battery tech, prevented other companies from making large AH NiMH batteries(their charge curve is not conducive to charging a bunch of smaller cells in parallel), and basically delayed EV adoption until LiIon became viable enough for Tesla to run with it.
We could have had the 94 mpg 160 mph capable Opel Eco Speedster in 2002, but same issue as above.
The engineering talent there is squandered on making bland, lowest-common-denominator products that are overly conservative. The cars are completely formulaic in a way that favors the next quarterly report, and little else. Then they use their clout to help keep competition away from willing buyers.
GM isn’t about making cars. Like most automakers, they’re about making short-term money. GM takes this to the level of pathology, and their products mostly reflect that, as does their history of repeated government bailouts when it inevitably blows up in their collective face.
The automotive landscape would be vastly improved without their input, with the engineers putting their efforts in other companies.
The PRIME example of GM shittiness is embodied in the new Blazer. The market had been moving to SUV’s and especially offroad focused SUV’s. While Jeep was making tons of money on the Wrangler and Ford was preparing the Bronco to compete with it, GM dropped a turd of a crossover and called it a day.
I’m glad to see the Camaro ZL1 get a shout out. That car is ridiculously capable for the price. I’m not sure if there’s a better performance per dollar sports car on the market. In the grand scheme of things I think it’s still somehow underrated. Everyone gets too caught up in the Camaro stigma to realize what a remarkable achievement that car was and still is until the end of this year. I want one to be honest and have been browsing listings off and on for a while but I think it’s more power than I can handle responsibly.
Also I can’t wait to see the Chrysler EV barge. I’m not sure that there’s a class of cars on the road that makes more sense to electrify than luxobarges. They’re already a heavy, leisurely, inefficient driving experience. Might as well throw some electric motors in to deal with the gas guzzling aspect, and the instant torque off the line will be welcomed. I will happily consider a 300/Charger sized EV if you can deck the interiors out to be pretty nice and the price hovers around where a V8 300 currently sits.
…speaking of which, that’s another car that isn’t appreciated enough. Once they’ve already depreciated to the low/mid 30s they’re great buys. It’s a Charger RT without the, you know…Charger-ness. It’s a nearly 400 horsepower, V8, rear wheel drive car that can seat 4 adults with room to spare. Plus the interiors are deceptively nice with a few options. If the addition of kiddos (the wife is pregnant! We haven’t shared it with anyone yet but fuck it my online friends can know) necessitates me going bigger than my Kona N a used 300 with the 5.7 would be high on my list.
Or…the upcoming ELECTROBARGE. For some reason my phone autocorrected that to all caps and you know what? Im gonna leave it that way. It feels right.
A large electric sedan could be big for livery/hire car use too – replacing whatever has replaced the Town Car (Suburbans/Navigators/etc?) in that tier below S-Class’ and the like.
I could also just be too engrossed in the current season of Succession when thinking of the use case.
Firstly, congrats! And second, I’d love if Chrysler or any company leaned into the scife-tinged future and called this car “ELECTROBARGE”. I know it doesn’t fit the luxury segment’s tastes, but that’d be great to see on the roads.
From my experience driving rental 300s and Chargers, their chassis rigidity compares unfavorably to wet noodles, so I wouldn’t recommend them to anyone concerned about their family’s safety.
“GM had a lead in EVs and didn’t really leverage it to its fullest potential because GM, much like pre-WWII America, was mired in complacency.”
Nope. They were focused on earnings like any other established company. And until recently there was no profit in EVs. There wasn’t a big enough market for any established large manufacturer to get serious about it.
Tesla needed to work for nearly a decade burning piles of cash to get the EV market to a place where there was enough demand, enough experience on the supplier side, enough public acceptance, to make EVs profitable. No established manufacturer could get away with that. You needed a startup with a crazy leader, some sheep, and some coolaid to pave the way. People willing to ignore every single normal indicator of success, and with blind faith, throw their money at it. GM, Ford, Stellantis, all would have had a crisis on their hand as investors fled, lenders hiked their rates, and their bottom cratered. Tesla paved the way (or at a minimum expedited things greatly if you don’t want to give them too much credit).
GM kept their toes in the water until the blue ocean warmed up. They don’t want to be Tesla. GM wants to survive, make profits, pay their shareholders and that is what they are doing. It’s not complacency, it’s an approach that has kept them around for generations. Because for every Tesla, there are so many others that have failed and no longer exist. That’s not an option for GM.
I don’t want to offend here, but Toyota has been kicking the can down the road for several decades now. As in lots of research, lots of production. And trying to test almost all possible solutions along the way. Elon does the TESLA dance and thinks he has become an icon. As to GM’s part in all this it appears that history will be the judge of who came to the party too late…and agree that GM is a totally different animal in many ways from both Tesla and Toyota.
GM will be around in some form or another until the heat death of the universe at this point.
If 2008 couldn’t kill them nothing will
But 2008 *did* kill them. The original GM was renamed “Motors Liquidation Company” and put out of its misery. The General Motors of today is only a few years old, and thanks to the government, was able to get all the assets of Motors Liquidation without the debts. Without the government intervening, they would be dead. Note I’m not saying it *shouldn’t* have happened – the economy and way to many people would have been ruined – I’m just saying GM is far from invisible.
You’re correct, although my point is more or less that Uncle Sam will step in to foot the bill again if they find themselves in trouble. They’re too big to fail at this point.