BY AUTOMOTIVE VENTURES | June 30 2025 | VIEW ONLINE

Automotive Ventures hosted our inaugural "Future of Mobility" Conference at the Porsche Experience Center Atlanta.15 presenters. 72 attendees.Here are the key takeaways:

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Automotive

Hertz is using artificial intelligence from UVeye to scan vehicles before and after renters use them, to check for damages and issue associated charges. One Hertz customer recently rented a Volkswagen from Hertz’s location at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, which was in fact the first store nationwide to use the tech. When the customer returned the car, they did so with a 1-inch scuff on the driver’s side rear wheel. The customer was alerted to the damage “minutes” after dropping the VW off, and with it, charges for the blemish: $250 for the repair, $125 for processing, and another $65 administrative fee. That’s $440 all told, for curb rash on one wheel. | The Drive

If you’re struggling to find a decent used car for under $20,000, you’re not alone, and you’re not imagining things. A new study from iSeeCars finds that the number of affordable, late-model used vehicles has dropped off a cliff in recent years. Back in 2019, nearly half (49.3%) of all 3-year-old used cars were priced at or below $20,000. Today, that number has shriveled to just 11.5%. The average price of a 3-year-old used car is now $32,635 — a staggering 40.9% jump from 2019, when it was just $23,159. While the pandemic may feel like old news, its economic aftershocks are still distorting the car market. The most affordable segment of the used market — cars under $20,000 — has shrunk dramatically across all major vehicle types. Passenger cars saw the steepest increase in price, climbing 48.7% since 2019. That means entry-level sedans that once anchored the affordable used car market are now largely out of reach. In 2019, more than 70% of 3-year-old passenger cars were priced under $20,000. In 2025? Just 28.1%. SUVs fared even worse, dropping from 39.2% to a mere 8.1% share in the sub-$20K category. | Autoblog

Rapid changes in U.S. industrial policy can roil businesses up and down the supply chain. Trump’s shifting stances on trade and tariffs have upended the planning of many companies that provide parts and equipment to big automakers. Other changes, like Trump’s move to reverse incentives for clean technology including electric vehicles, have left suppliers grappling with sunk costs and struggling to shift gears. Trump is betting that the pain will be short-lived and that eventually tariffs will push more companies to follow General Motors' decision to invest $4 billion in adding production and workers in the US over the next two years. That could pay off for the small players that provide equipment to U.S. factories — if they can hang on. | Bloomberg ($)

Under the ownership of Liberty Media, Formula 1 has started to cement itself as a pop culture phenomenon rather than just a motorsport, with kids picking up the LEGO and Mattel toy cars and driver figurines; youngsters going to F1 exhibitions and playing branded games; and more high-rolling VIP guests splurging $5,000 and more on a “Paddock Club” experience with tours of the track and pit lanes. Sponsors are recognizing the shift: one new deal with LVMH alone will bring the company more than $1 billion over the next decade, while tech giants are also jumping in the mix to try and associate themselves with F1’s sleek, high-octane image and new fan base. Indeed, the F1 group generated $634 million in sponsorship revenue for fiscal year 2024, roughly double what it made back when the motorsport was acquired by Liberty in 2017. | Sherwood

Inside an eight-ton carbon fiber pod in a hangarlike building outside Paris, Renault engineers are testing the dynamic performance of future models, even down to how different compound tires feel on various road surfaces. With a human driver at the wheel of a test mule inside and navigating a virtual 360-degree landscape, the black pod swings, sways and dips like a dancer, simulating real-world performance. Engineers can gather and analyze data to head off problems, refine driving dynamics or improve safety features. The pod, called ROADS, is a key part of Renault’s new Immersive Simulation Center and is the largest such structure in Europe, the automaker says. Using the cloud, operators can “drive” digital twins that have become an integral part of vehicle development. The broad aim with digital twins is to shorten development time, save money and correct any problems well before cars get to start of production, let alone in the hands of buyers. | Automotive News ($)

RVs are the ticket to an itinerant, back-to-nature lifestyle for millions of Americans. Behind those footloose dreams, however, are vehicle-quality problems that have been blamed for injuries and deaths. Forest River, owned by Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, is one of the RV industry’s Big Three, along with THOR Industries, Inc. and Winnebago. Over the past decade, those companies have reported more recalls than Detroit’s Big Three automakers, even though they make far fewer vehicles. RVs have to operate as both houses and vehicles. The complexity of that production leads to more recalls, according to Forest River. Executives, consultants and analysts say the RV industry’s unique manufacturing practices also play a major role. Unlike highly automated car plants, RV factories typically rely on workers who assemble vehicles by hand. Employees are often paid by the unit instead of a straight hourly wage and can leave once they hit their quota. Some former workers say the system encourages speed over thoroughness. From 2015 to 2024, no single automaker or RV manufacturer issued more recalls than Forest River. About half of its recalls between 2020 and 2024 were due to manufacturing errors rather than faulty parts or poor engineering, according to The Wall Street Journal analysis of federal data. | The Wall Street Journal ($)

The U.S. is trying to re-establish a domestic supply chain for the high-performance magnets used in products such as drones, electric vehicles, smartphones, medical devices and military weapons. The geopolitical stakes are sobering. China dominates the market for a category of minerals known as “rare earths,” which are needed to make the magnets, as well as for the magnets themselves. Beijing exercised that dominance in recent weeks when it starved American automakers of needed supplies, seeking leverage over trade talks with President Donald Trump. | The Washington Post ($)

Ford still faces difficulties obtaining vital magnets made with rare-earth elements, despite a deal the U.S. struck with China to ease export controls, a company executive said Monday. Ford in May stopped production at a vehicle factory in the Chicago area because of a magnet shortage. The situation has improved, but the company still needs to “move things around” to avoid manufacturing shutdowns given the scarcity of the materials, Drake told reporters during a briefing at an EV battery plant the company is building in Michigan. China in April began requiring companies to apply for permission to export magnets made with rare-earth metals, including dysprosium and terbium. The country controls roughly 90% of the world’s supply of these elements, which help magnets to operate at high temperatures. Much of the world’s modern technology, from smartphones to jet fighters, rely on these magnets. | The Wall Street Journal ($)

CCC Intelligent Solutions' Q2 "Crash Course" report is available. | CCC

Tesla Insurance launched with a promise: harness real-time driving data, reward safe behavior, and undercut legacy insurers. The pitch? “We know our cars best, so we can price risk better.” In May 2025, Tesla’s insurance arm posted a combined ratio of 121% — meaning for every dollar in premiums, it paid out $1.21 in claims and expenses. In this chart, you can see just how far off the mark Tesla is compared to the industry average. The loss ratio shows what portion of premiums is paid out in claims, while the combined ratio adds all expenses. Above 100%? You’re losing money on every single policy you sell, even before you count the cost of keeping the lights on. For Tesla, that means underwriting losses — $42 million in the first nine months of 2024 alone. | Autoblog

A growing body of studies and an increasing number of people have found that they feel more motion sick riding in EVs than in traditional petrol or diesel cars. Anecdotes of feeling sick in the passenger or back seat of electric cars litter social media, as do questions from wary prospective buyers. There is a scientific explanation behind why a person might feel more sick in an EV, though, according to multiple academic studies. “Greater sickness in EVs can be attributed to a lack of previous experience, as both a driver and as a passenger, where the brain lacks accuracy in estimating the motion forces because it relies on previous experience in other types of cars,” said William Emond, a PhD student researching car sickness at the Université de Technologie de Belfort-Montbéliard in France. | The Guardian

Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited (CATL), the world’s largest maker of electric vehicle batteries, plans to bring its battery-swapping and recycling technology to Europe, amid a global battle to secure more sustainable EV supply chains. In an interview with the Financial Times, Jiang Li, the Chinese group’s board secretary, said battery swapping — in which EV drivers exchange depleted cells for fully charged ones — had “huge potential” in Europe to make batteries cheaper and longer-lasting. Battery swapping, technology pioneered by Chinese electric-car maker NIO, takes minutes and lowers the upfront cost of buying an electric car, as drivers do not own their own batteries — the most expensive components of an EV. It also enables the cells to be used for longer. Battery swapping had been slow to expand outside of China due to the high cost of building the service stations required. But it is gaining traction amid growing concerns about battery supply chains on the back of rising geopolitical tensions and growth in EV sales. | Financial Times ($)

Solid-state batteries—which trade the gooey center of conventional lithium-ion batteries for a solid core—have the potential to improve smartphones and EVs alike. Ion Storage Systems’ unusual approach could yield power cells that last 50% longer, charge significantly faster, and have a near-zero chance of catching fire when damaged. Then again, that’s long been the promise in a field notorious for dashing the hopes of both startups and established giants. Despite decades of trying to make solid-state batteries commercially viable, we still haven’t seen any outside of niche applications. Automakers have announced partnerships with solid-state battery makers, yet none have moved beyond testing. Investors have been so disappointed that global venture-capital investment in such companies is on track to be at its lowest level since 2017, according to data from research firm PitchBook. | The Wall Street Journal ($)

Out in the Nevada desert, JB Straubel’s Redwood Materials flipped the switch on the largest microgrid in North America, powered by 805 retired EV batteries and fueling an AI data center. With his new venture, Redwood Energy, Straubel is turning yesterday’s car batteries into tomorrow’s clean, profitable power source. And it may be outpacing the company’s core recycling business in the process. | TechCrunch ($)

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China

In tracing the origins of China's EV dominance, analysts often credit Wan Gang - a German-trained engineer who became China's minister of trade and science in 2007. "He looked around and said, 'Good news: we are now the largest car market in the world. Bad news: on the streets of Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou all I see is foreign brands'," says Michael Dunne from Dunne Insights. At the time, Chinese brands simply couldn't compete with the European, American and Japanese car makers for quality and prestige. These companies had an unassailable head start when it came to producing petrol or diesel-powered cars. But China did have ample resources, a skilled labour force and an ecosystem of suppliers in the motor industry. So Mr Wan decided to "change the game and flip the script by moving to electrics", according to Mr Dunne. This was the master plan. Even though the Chinese government had included EVs in its five-year economic blueprint as early as 2001, it wasn't until the 2010s that it started to provide vast amounts of subsidies to grow the industry. China, unlike Western democracies, has the capacity to mobilise huge swathes of its economy over many years towards its aims. The country's mammoth infrastructure projects and dominance in manufacturing are a testament to this. A U.S. think tank, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), estimates that from 2009 to the end of 2023, Beijing spent around $231bn (£172bn) developing the EV industry. | BBC

Fascinating read by Michael Dunne on how we came to rely on China for rare earth magnets. | Dunne Insights

China's auto industry has inflated car sales for years through a burgeoning government-backed grey market that registers new cars right off the assembly line and then ships them overseas as "used" vehicles. These so-called "zero-mileage" cars have never been driven but they are being exported as used to markets like Russia, Central Asia and the Middle East, allowing Chinese automakers to show growth and to dispose of cars that it would be difficult to sell domestically, according to a Reuters review of government documents and interviews with five auto dealers and car traders. | Reuters ($)

Chinese car brands reached their highest-ever market share in Europe in May, after sales grew by 85%, to more than 60,000, compared with 2024. In a total market up just 1.3% to 1,116,095, Chinese automakers’ torrid growth took their market share in Europe to 5.4%, only the second time it has been above 5%. Their share was 3% in the same period last year and 4.6% in April 2025, figures from market researcher Dataforce show. | Automotive News ($)

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Autonomy, Robotics & AI

Tesla’s long-awaited robotaxi service has finally hit the road. But rather than help justify the electric-car maker’s sky-high valuation, it really highlights how underappreciated Google-parent Alphabet might be for its own, much more advanced self-driving venture. Robotaxis are among the moonshots supposedly underpinning Tesla’s $1.1 trillion market capitalization. That is more than the combined market cap of the world’s next 20 automakers by market value, according to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence. Tesla’s share price is down 19% this year, but the stock still trades around 150 times projected earnings for the next four quarters. That is far above Alphabet’s multiple of 18.5 times, while Ford, General Motors, Toyota, Mercedes-Benz and Honda currently average multiples of about 7.6 times forward earnings, according to FactSet data. Waymo raised $5.6 billion in a late-stage funding round last year. That deal valued Waymo at $45 billion, which put it among the 10 most-valuable, venture-backed companies that haven’t yet gone public, according to data from PitchBook. | The Wall Street Journal ($)

On generous assumptions, Tesla’s core EV business, generating 75% of gross profit but with falling sales, might be worth roughly $50 per share, only 15% of the current price. Much of the remainder relates to expectations around self-driving. RBC Capital Markets, for example, ascribes 59% of its price target, or $181 per share, to robotaxis and a further $53 to monetizing Full-Self-Driving technology. Combined, that is $815 billion based on double-digit multiples ascribed to modeled revenue — not earnings — 10 to 15 years from now because, after all, it relates to businesses that barely make money today. Subject to revision, then, but that works to Tesla’s advantage. Consider: Over the past two years, Tesla’s EV business has stalled, its Cybertruck launch has flopped, a promised low-cost model remains elusive and earnings have slumped. Yet since Musk pivoted hard toward robotaxis and robots in early 2024, its multiple has more than doubled to around 140 times forward earnings. Multiples are numeric manifestations of faith. It has not mattered that Musk touted incoming robotaxis for years without delivering. With nearly two billion passenger vehicles on the world’s roads, the potential market for robotaxis is gargantuan and Tesla is bound to be a leader at some indeterminate, but undoubtedly lucrative, point in the future. | Bloomberg ($)

Ford CEO Jim Farley expressed skepticism about the technological approach to self-driving cars being pursued by Tesla, citing consumer “trust” and the need to “be really careful” as reasons why Ford sees more potential in systems based on laser sensors like those in Waymo vehicles. The comments are the latest indication of the auto industry’s resistance to Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s vision of less expensive self-driving vehicles that use only video cameras and artificial intelligence — a bet Musk believes will ultimately pay off and prompt other automakers to license Tesla’s technology. But Ford, the number three automaker in the U.S., which plans to work with partners to incorporate self-driving technology into its future vehicles, does not seem likely to license Tesla’s tech anytime soon, based on Farley’s comments. “When you have a brand like Ford, when there’s a new technology, you have to be really careful,” Farley said at the Aspen Ideas Festival. “We really believe that LiDAR is mission-critical,” Farley said, referring to the laser sensors used by companies like Waymo. Farley was being interviewed by Walter Isaacson, who published a biography on Elon Musk in 2023. When their conversation turned to autonomy, Isaacson asked Farley to compare both Waymo and Tesla’s systems, and he asked which approach made more sense. “To us, Waymo,” Farley said. He pointed out that both Waymo, owned by Google-parent Alphabet Inc., and Tesla “have made a lot of progress” on self-driving, and Farley acknowledged that he has had conversations with Elon Musk. But he stated that Ford considered LiDAR to be an important part of the picture, noting that “where the camera will be completely blinded, the LiDAR system will see exactly what’s in front of you.” | Fortune

Self-driving cars have long featured in sci-fi renderings of the future: in Da Vinci sketches, World’s Fairs, and The Jetsons. But many people don’t realize that a handful of cities already exist in that future—and that the transition, all things considered, has been relatively painless. In San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Austin, and Atlanta, Waymo driverless taxis are completing more than 250,000 paid rides a week and traversing over 2 million miles: more than double their reach last year, and the equivalent of three human lifetimes of driving. Waymos do not drive perfectly. But scores of data suggest that they are already much safer than human drivers, reducing injury-causing collisions by around 80%. And culturally, they have mostly been accepted into these cities as mere facts of the road. As they enter more and more cities, Waymo’s leaders stress that their central mission is road safety: to eradicate as many accidents as possible. In Phoenix this summer, they’ll launch solo trips (tied to a parent’s account) for teens 14 to 17, aiming to reduce accidents—which are the leading cause of death for U.S. teens—and freeing parents from shuttling kids around. Waymo’s leaders also believe its rise could, within the next decade, foment a greener, more livable future for cities, in which transportation is instantaneous and cheap—and in which a decrease in car ownership has unshackled urban congestion. “The way cities will look will be drastically different,” says co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana. “Our expectations of safe mobility options are going to be completely transformed.” | Time

Tesla needs a win. After a bruising year marked by slowing EV sales, shrinking margins, and a CEO whose personal brand is increasingly overshadowing his company’s, the once-unstoppable EV-maker has found itself in unfamiliar territory: vulnerable. Tesla, for years considered a category-defining disruptor, now looks a lot more like a legacy car company with a very modern PR problem. So when Elon Musk unveiled Tesla’s first robotaxi pilot in Austin, Texas, over the weekend — complete with human safety monitors, geofenced routes, and a wink at meme culture with a $4.20 fare — it wasn’t just another headline-generating Musk stunt. It was a signal flare. The handful of driverless-ish Model Ys zipping through a small part of Texas may seem like a modest rollout, but for Tesla, they represent something far bigger: a bet that autonomous driving can do what EVs no longer reliably can — drive growth, justify a sky-high valuation, and restore some of the tech-world magic Musk once had at his fingertips. In other words, the robotaxi rollout isn’t just a pilot. It’s a pivot. | Quartz

Federal safety regulators have reached out to Tesla a day after the automaker began providing rides in its branded robotaxis in Austin. The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration NHTSA contacted Tesla after numerous videos posted online appear to show Tesla robotaxis violating traffic laws in South Austin, where the company is providing rides to invited customers. | TechCrunch ($)Philip Koopman documents some of the challenges emerging from the Tesla robotaxi launch in Austin, Texas. | Phil Koopman

A decade after Uber upended New York’s yellow taxi industry, another Silicon Valley giant is threatening to push the city’s cabbies to the brink of extinction. Waymo, a robot-driven car service owned by Google's parent company Alphabet, applied for a permit with the city transportation department to test out a small fleet of autonomous vehicles in an outlined Manhattan zone between Central Park and the Battery, and some parts of Downtown Brooklyn. If approved, the cars wouldn’t pick up passengers, but would guide themselves while a company employee monitors from the passenger’s seat. The pilot aims to prove they’re safe for New York City’s chaotic streets. The company already operates in several major cities across the country, particularly on the West Coast. State law mandates that any car in New York must be operated by a human. Waymo officials said they’re lobbying lawmakers to remove the ban. But the prospect of driverless taxis faces strong political headwinds because Waymo threatens the livelihood of the city’s roughly 100,000 taxi and for-hire vehicle drivers, New York Taxi Workers Alliance Bhairavi Desai said. | Gothamist

Waymo robotaxis can now be hailed in Atlanta via Uber. The two companies, which already offer the “Waymo on Uber” service in Austin, said on Tuesday the commercial service will initially cover about 65 square miles in Atlanta. The launch, if successful, is poised to propel the businesses of both companies. Uber, which has locked in partnerships with 18 autonomous vehicles companies, said it has an annual run-rate of 1.5 million mobility and delivery AV trips on its network. Meanwhile, Waymo said it provides 250,000 paid robotaxi rides every week across Austin, Los Angeles, Phoenix and San Francisco. The addition of Atlanta to that list should push those numbers up. Waymo’s fleet in Atlanta is in the “dozens” and will eventually be expanded over time, a company spokesperson told TechCrunch. The companies have previously said the fleet shared between Atlanta and Austin will grow to the hundreds. | TechCrunch ($)

Uber is in talks with founder Travis Kalanick to help fund his acquisition of the U.S. arm of Chinese self-driving firm Pony.ai, The New York Times reported. Kalanick would run Pony.ai if the deal is completed while continuing to lead his current company, CloudKitchens. Kalanick was ousted as CEO at Uber in 2017 and left the board in 2019, severing, at the time, his last ties to the company he founded. Uber has moved quickly over the past year to prove that it can be the go-to commercial platform for driverless carmakers, even as it’s evolved its strategy from developing self-driving technology in-house when Kalanick was at the helm. It’s struck more than a dozen partnerships with autonomous vehicle makers and software makers and has invested in some of them, too. | Automotive News ($)

Sam Altman has made many big claims about what OpenAI will be able to do, including spearheading ultra-expansive data centers and building artificial intelligence that can rival the abilities of Ph.D. holders. But he also recently made a significant, yet largely overlooked, assertion. OpenAI is seeking to crack the code for advanced autonomous driving. “We have some new technology that could just do self-driving for standard cars way better than any current approach has worked,” Altman said last week on the “Uncapped With Jack Altman” podcast, which his brother hosts. Altman added, “If our A.I. techniques can really go drive a car, that’s pretty cool.” | The New York Times ($)

Amazon's Zoox has opened the first-ever serial production facility for purpose-built robotaxis in the U.S. The facility will be utilized for planned growth and robotaxi services at Zoox across multiple markets, starting with Las Vegas, followed by San Francisco, and with additional locations such as Austin and Miami expected to follow in the next few years. Located in Hayward, California, the facility spans 220,000 square feet, equivalent to 3 ½ American football fields. On this currently installed line and once at full scale, Zoox has the capacity to assemble more than 10,000 robotaxis a year. | Zoox

China’s maglev research program has logged a new speed milestone, launching a 1.1-tonne test vehicle to 650 km/h (about 404 mph) in only seven seconds and within 600 m of track. The run, conducted on the 1-km demonstration line at Donghu Laboratory in Hubei Province, showcases a short-distance “sprint” approach that relies on electromagnetic propulsion rather than the long test tracks, often 30 km or more, used elsewhere. Engineers achieved the breakthrough by pairing a high-power linear motor with magnetic levitation “like-pole repulsion” that keeps the vehicle floating fractionally above the guideway. Eliminating wheel-rail contact means the prototype battles only aerodynamic drag, enabling extreme acceleration and, just as importantly, tightly controlled braking. | Interesting Engineering

A collective of young, largely English-speaking hackers called Scattered Spider is now targeting airlines and the transportation sector, according to cybersecurity experts. The warning comes after at least two airlines have reported intrusions in the last month, including a WestJet incident that media reports have already connected to Scattered Spider. The group previously targeted the retail sector, insurance agencies, hotel chains, casinos, and even tech companies. Scattered Spider is known for using deceptive tactics like social engineering and phishing to steal sensitive data, and it has also been connected to threats of violence. | TechCrunch ($)

A new report from the nonprofit The International Council on Clean Transportation sheds light on which nations are driving the largest share of planet-warming pollution from private jets — and which airports stand out. “It’s pretty well known that in a typical year, private jets are responsible for about 2 percent of aviation emissions,” said Dan Rutherford, the group’s senior director of research and a co-author of the new report. “What we’ve done for the first time is, we’ve basically used flight trajectory data to break that out into the individual contributions of airports and countries.” The study spotlights the outsize impact of the United States on emissions. Globally, private jets emitted up to 19.5 million metric tons of greenhouse gases in 2023: Aircraft departing from the United States accounted for 65% of global private jet flights, and 55% of those gas emissions. | The Washington Post ($)

Our Automotive Ventures "Car of the Week": a 1970 Ferrari 365 GTB/4 Daytona “Plexi” | Broad Arrow

Have a great week,Steve Greenfield

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On this week's "Future of Automotive" segment on CBT News, we report on Hertz' use of the UVeye technology at their airport rental locations. | CBT News ($)

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