Intel Report: The Weekly Mobility News That Matters

BY AUTOMOTIVE VENTURES | Nov 10 2025 | VIEW ONLINE

Automotive Ventures is very excited to announce that Dalton, one of the largest dealership groups in Mexico, has joined our over-subscribed $19 million Mobility Fund II. | LINK

What We're Reading:

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Automotive

In an interview this week with CBS Sunday Morning, Ford CEO Jim Farley compared China’s car industry of today to that of 1980s Japan, but "on steroids." According to Farley: "They have enough [production] capacity in China with existing factories to serve the entire North American market, put us all out of business. Japan never had that, so this is a completely different level of risk for our industry." | Motor1.comTesla shareholders have overwhelmingly approved a compensation package for CEO Elon Musk that could be worth as much as $1 trillion in company shares. More than 75% of shareholders who participated voted to approve the plan, in line with the amount of support Musk has received for past pay packages. As the result was announced, shareholders in the room at Tesla’s Austin, Texas, factory began chanting: “Elon! Elon!” Under the deal, Musk will not be awarded $1 trillion right away. Nor will he receive a salary. But he stands to make hundreds of billions of dollars and gain more control of Tesla if he helps the company achieve a number of milestones and boost its profits along the way. Some of those hurdles will be difficult to clear. Many, though, are simply watered down versions of promises Musk has made for years. The pay package is broken into 12 tranches — covering operational, adjusted profit, and market capitalization goals — each one giving more shares to Musk if those goals are reached. For instance, Tesla, which today has a market capitalization of about $1.5 trillion, will need to steadily increase that valuation and hit $8.5 trillion in a decade. | TechCrunch ($)Japanese automakers warned that President Trump’s trade tariffs will cost them billions in lost profits, describing the import duties as a “new normal” that the industry will be forced to endure for the foreseeable future. The cautionary message came two months after a trade agreement that Japan negotiated with the United States took effect. Under the deal, Tokyo agreed to invest $550 billion in the United States in exchange for a 15% across-the-board tariff on its exports. Mr. Trump had initially imposed a 27.5% tariff on Japanese exporters, a devastating tax for the country’s crucial automotive sector. Japanese auto companies have publicly expressed gratitude for the government's negotiation of a better rate, but many industry executives have privately complained that even a 15% tariff erodes already thin profit margins for manufacturers. They are concerned that the tariffs may stick even beyond the current U.S. administration. The United States is the largest market for Japanese carmakers. Despite building extensive American manufacturing capacity, a large share of the cars sold there — along with their parts — are still sourced from Japan, constituting its largest U.S. export. | The New York Times ($)Automakers transporting their cars to the U.S. could face $200 to $300 per vehicle in additional costs, the CEO of car carrier Wallenius Wilhelmsen told Reuters on Wednesday, as the company seeks to pass on new U.S. port fees to customers. Higher-than-expected U.S. port fees on foreign-built ships took effect in mid-October as part of a trade dispute between China and the U.S. That prompted Wallenius Wilhelmsen, which operates "roll-on/roll-off" carriers that ship cars and heavy machinery worldwide, to withdraw its financial outlook. | Reuters ($)Tesla posted some of its steepest sales declines this year in European markets, where the Elon Musk-led automaker is mired in a protracted slump. The most pronounced drop reported thus far was in Sweden, where Tesla registered only 133 new cars last month, down 89% from a year ago, according to the nation’s auto manufacturers’ association. Sales fell roughly by half in Norway, the Netherlands and Italy, and by almost a third in Spain. France was the exception, with Tesla’s October registrations there rising 2.4%. However, that compares with a depressed level — sales in October 2024 plunged 47% from a year earlier. Through the first 10 months of this year, the company’s registrations were down 30%. | Bloomberg ($)

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EVs

Ford is considering scrapping its electric F-150 Lightning pickup truck, according to The Wall Street Journal. A Ford spokesman declined to comment on future product plans, but noted that the F-150 Lightning had record sales in the third quarter and remains the top-selling electric pickup in the US. Ford's electric vehicle sales fell last month, as demand for battery-powered models plunged following the expiration of a federal tax credit, and the company is looking to focus its EV efforts on smaller, cheaper vehicles. | Bloomberg ($)Toyota aims to “achieve the world’s first practical use of all-solid-state batteries in BEVs” after securing a new partnership with Sumitomo Metal Mining to mass-produce the new battery tech. Toyota has been hyping up solid-state batteries for nearly a decade. It was initially planning to launch them in 2020, but the launch was pushed back to 2023, then to 2026. The new tech is still a few years away, but Toyota insists it will become a reality. At the Tokyo Motor Show, Keiji Kaita, president of Toyota’s Carbon Neutral Advanced Engineering Development Center, confirmed it’s “sticking on the schedule” to introduce its first solid-state battery-powered EV by 2028. | ElectrekHow does a fully charged battery in under 100 seconds sound? China's CATL, GAC, and JD.com revealed a battery-swappable version of the Aion UT that can swap batteries quicker than you can pump gas. The new battery swap version looks about the same as the current Aion UT sold in China, but it’s equipped with CATL’s Choco-SEB battery packs. CATL introduced the new battery packs in December that can be swapped for a fully charged one in under 100 seconds, making it just as fast as filling up a gas tank. | ElectrekRenault has delivered on its promise to reveal the new Twingo battery-electric minicar within two years at a price of less than €20,000 — but to meet its target, the automaker had to learn from the playbook of Chinese rivals. To meet the price target, Renault said it had to “radically rethink its design and production methods.” The Twingo was delegated to the group’s Ampere EV subsidiary, and developed in France, China and Slovenia. Development was carried out in Europe and China, where Renault tapped engineers at its ACDC R&D center in Shanghai. Chinese suppliers included Launch Design, which helped translate the design into the body-in-white, and CATL, which produces the batteries. This collaborative approach reduced planning time by 16%, development time by 41% and industrialization by 26%, Renault said. In addition to speeding the development time, Renault says the investment was cut in half for a comparable vehicle. | Automotive News ($)

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China

Brazil is South America’s largest car market and, like other countries, Chinese companies in the market are competing head-to-head with long-established brands. In early 2025, Chinese models captured more than 80% of all EV sales, according to Brazil’s Electric Vehicle Association. Affordability has been a major draw. BYD’s Dolphin Mini, one of the country’s top-selling electric cars, starts at about 119,900 reais or $22,000, around $7,000 less than General Motors’ cheapest comparable model in Brazil. After Brazil dropped its 35% import tariff on EVs in 2015, BYD moved quickly to expand locally. The company first entered the country in 2015 producing electric buses and now operates what it calls one of Latin America’s largest EV plants in the northeastern state of Bahia. Built on the site of a shuttered Ford Motor Company facility, the 4.6-million-square-meter complex is expected to produce up to 300,000 cars a year. | CNBC

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Autonomy, Robotics & AI

Waymo said Monday it will launch a robotaxi service in Detroit, Las Vegas, and San Diego as the Alphabet-owned company hits the accelerator on its expansion plans. “By the end of 2026, you should expect us to be offering 1 million trips per week,” Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana said. Waymo completed more than 250,000 rides per week as of April. The company has since added more, although it has not shared a specific number. | TechCrunch ($)Rivian has created its second spinoff company this year: an industrial AI and robotics venture called Mind Robotics. The new effort will be focused around using “industrial AI to reshape how physical world businesses operate and leverage Rivian operations data as the foundation for a robotics data flywheel,” according to a the company’s third-quarter shareholder letter published Tuesday. Rivian has secured around $110 million in “external seed capital” for Mind Robotics, but did not offer other information about the new company. A trademark application for Mind Robotics was submitted to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on Monday that lists Eclipse partner Jiten Behl as a signatory for the newly-created company, along with Eclipse’s Palo Alto headquarters as the corporate address. Behl did not immediately respond to a request for comment. | TechCrunch ($)Toyota has displayed a revolutionary mobility concept called Walk Me, a four-legged autonomous chair that walks where wheels cannot. Presented at the Japan Mobility Show 2025, the device aims to address the everyday challenges faced by people with reduced mobility, such as climbing stairs, moving over uneven ground, or climbing into a car. The innovation marks a significant step in Toyota’s exploration of assistive mobility, combining robotics, artificial intelligence, and ergonomic design into one compact, adaptable system. | Interesting Engineering

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Aviation & Space

SpaceX is buying another $2.6 billion worth of wireless spectrum licenses from EchoStar, an expansion of a $17 billion deal announced in September, as its satellite internet business Starlink continues to win new customers around the world. The spectrum sale comes just a day after SpaceX revealed it has passed 8 million global customers. On Thursday, the company added more commercial contracts to that total. International Airlines Group (IAG) announced it will install Starlink inflight internet on more than 500 aircraft across its portfolio, which includes British Airways, Iberia, and Aer Lingus. The additional EchoStar spectrum will be used to grow Starlink’s nascent “direct to cell” constellation, which initially lets T-Mobile customers access satellite-based 5G internet. | TechCrunch ($)

🚘 Car of the Week

Our Automotive Ventures "Car of the Week": the 1991 McLaren MP4/6 driven by Ayrton Senna in February 1991. The final V-12-powered, manual gearbox model to win a Formula 1 World Championship.Ayrton Senna is unquestionably one of the greatest Formula 1 drivers who ever lived. And this McLaren MP4/6-1 may be his most famous car. Now, it is up for sale at RM Sotheby's. The pre-auction estimate for this irreplaceable piece of history is $12 million to $15 million.If there is ever a debate about Senna being one of the greatest Formula 1 drivers, watching the 1991 Brazilian Grand Prix should remove any doubts. By 1991, Senna had already won the Formula 1 Driver’s World Championship twice. However, a victory at his home race at Interlagos eluded him. With 10 laps to go, Senna seemed to finally be cruising towards his first Brazilian Grand Prix victory. But a broken gearbox nearly changed everything.As if the rain was not challenging enough, his gearbox failed. Senna lost fourth gear and struggled to engage fifth and sixth. His lead began to dwindle. By the last lap, his lead was down to 4 seconds, and his gearbox only offered up sixth gear. He fought for 2.7 miles with a car that he could barely control. Incredibly, he managed to win that race by nearly 3 seconds, but his team had to lift his exhausted body out of the car. It was a performance that cemented his legacy and left an indelible mark on the sport of Formula 1. | RM Sotheby's

Have a great week,Steve Greenfield

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Automotive Ventures hosted a dinner in Miami with some of our favorite people in the industry.

👀 In the News

📢 Thanks to Mark Hollmer at Automotive News for the great coverage of Automotive Ventures' newest investment out of our DealerFund: EPIC. | Automotive News ($)📢 Steve caught up with Dan Carrigan from the Virginia Automobile Dealers Association (VADA) to discuss the outlook for the automotive industry in Q4 and into 2026. | VADA📢 Steve had a great conversation with Mark Hollmer at Automotive News about the implications of AI on automotive dealership operations. | Automotive News ($)