#Industry

Faraday Future’s preeminence in bad publicity has been unsurpassed as of late. It has amassed legal disputes almost as fast as I can report them, so another lawsuit might seem par for the course — until you realize it’s for an almost trifling amount over a mismanaged squabble surrounding the company’s domain name.

A complaint was filed against the automotive startup in San Francisco County Superior Court on November 18th of last year by a business acting as a broker for obtaining the company’s current domain name. The document outlines a $210,000 claim against Faraday for neglecting to remunerate Domains Cable for services that resulted in the acquisition of FF.com.

Suzuki and Toyota Motor Corp. have agreed to begin official talks on pushing their partnership further. The partnership memorandum announced today covers a wide range of issues crucial to developing and producing automobiles, while keeping Suzuki independent as an automaker. Toyota is apparently not interested in corporate control. The automaker showed a similar gentle touch in its partnerships with Mazda Motor Corp. and Subaru parent company Fuji Heavy Industries.

Instead, the two companies have agreed to start brainstorming on how to best collaborate on advanced safety systems, environmentally friendly tech, information technology, overlapping components, and shared product.

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles wants to grow its dealer network by 380 new stores in a bid to improve its dwindling market share. The plan isn’t going over so well with the company’s existing dealers, however. As the strategy could potentially threaten their present businesses, some of those dealerships are putting up a fight over the issue.

The choice to expand comes at a difficult time. Sales locations aren’t doing the best and suffering through a diluted and unpopular product lineup while the automaker shifts its focus away from cars to the more-popular SUVS and trucks. FCA sales have been on the decline for almost six months and the company’s slice of the U.S. market fell to 12 percent in the fourth quarter of 2016, compared to 13.6 percent in the same period of 2015. The expansion decision also goes against the advice of FCA’s dealership location consultant, Urban Science.

Takata, the damned Japanese parts supplier with the exceptionally dangerous airbags, has lost the two top executives at its United States headquarters. According to their LinkedIn profiles, former North American President Kevin Kennedy and former Executive Vice President Robert Fisher are no longer with the company.

Meanwhile, BMW Group is recalling roughly 230,000 vehicles in the U.S. after discovering that some could have been outfitted with defective Takata Corp. airbag inflators during repairs.

Tata Motors is best known for its unbelievably affordable and incredibly petite Nano supermini and the tiny Ace work truck. In fact, the two are so affordable that you could purchase them both in India with every optional extra and they would cost roughly the same as a base U.S. model Nissan Versa with no add-ons.

Despite still being deeply rooted in the economy car scene, Tata has grown in recent years — it currently builds smaller SUVs — and now wants to build itself a sportscar. While your first inclination is probably to say “how adorable” in a belittling tone, don’t forget that Tata also constructs vans, city buses, commercial trucks, construction equipment, and military vehicles. It could turn out a little basic, but the Indian automaker is probably up to the challenge of a small sports car.

Still, how utterly adorable.

President Donald Trump is having a pow-wow with General Motors chief executive Mary Barra, Tesla CEO Elon Musk and a slew of other top U.S. executives today. The business community finds itself increasingly divided over how to respond to certain policies, especially after Uber CEO Travis Kalanick quit the president’s advisory panel over an executive order that temporarily ceased travel to the United States from seven predominantly Muslim countries.

Pressure from activists has forced numerous companies to take a public stance on the issue. Elon Musk in particular has begun to face harsh criticism for condemning the ban but continuing to work with the White House on business issues.

BMW Group CEO Harald Krüger says the automaker fully intends on sicking with its current investment strategies in Mexico and the United States, even after President Donald Trump’s proposal to levy steep import taxes on vehicles brought into American borders.

“We need free world trade,” Krueger told the CAR Symposium automotive congress in Bochum, Germany, on Wednesday.

Faraday Future had already broken ground on a sprawling $1 billion factory in North Las Vegas when a multi-million dollar late fee forced contractors to go on hiatus last November. Then, at CES 2017, the company announced the resumption of construction as the city’s mayor waved to the crowd — a physical manifestation of goodwill towards the company’s new promises.

What they did not say, however, was that the factory would be a fraction of the size as originally claimed, existing as a smaller-scale starter plant. Faraday is the automotive equivalent of Monty Python’s Black Knight. It continues to suffer horrendous blows that cripple its operational ability, all the while telling the world, “Tis but a scratch.”

The U.S. Senate voted ninety-three to six to confirm Elaine Chao as transportation secretary on Tuesday.

Chao, a former labor secretary and deputy transportation secretary, will face familiar issues while providing oversight on some new obstacles — specifically, autonomous vehicles and upholding President Trump’s promise to improve the nation’s infrastructure.

The cornerstone of every healthy relationship is frank and frequent communication. Last year, consumers wanted more sport utility vehicles, but automakers still had too many cars rolling off assembly lines. Caught in the crossfire were forlorn dealerships that were incapable of providing the trucks and crossovers that customers cannot seem to get enough of.

At the 2017 National Automobile Dealers Association Conference & Expo, this issue is apparently weighing so heavily on the minds of America’s automotive purveyors that it wouldn’t be surprising if gray matter began leaking out of their ears and onto the expo floor.

Ford Motor Co. has hired former Apple marketing guru Musa Tariq as part of its expanding need to make the case that it is a mobility company not simply an automaker. Taking the newly created position of vice president and chief brand officer, Tariq will help construct and differentiate the brand identify Ford is hoping to carefully curate for itself.

Cars were for your grandfather’s generation. We now have mobility solutions.

When Faraday Future showcased its new car at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show, everyone temporarily forgot the company was a structural and monetary dumpster fire. A large portion of that amnesia was the result of the extremely impressive presentation put on for the FF 91’s unveiling. Some of the visual effects used by Faraday in its presentations and propaganda marketing have been so impressive, it left me wondering who the company has trusted with those projects.

One company Faraday outsourced to was The Mill — a New York-based video production company that is suing Faraday for 1.8 million dollars over failure to pay it for a graphic presentation commissioned in September.

This is an exciting return to form for Faraday Future, which announced at CES that the construction of its Nevada factory — stalled due to similar payment issues — should continue shortly.

A few months from now, if you’re driving your Chevrolet to get serviced and accidentally pull into a Ford automotive center, they will probably have you covered. In a bid to snag a little piece of everyone else’s action, Ford is launching a new parts brand for vehicles made by other automakers.

Omnicraft, the first new brand for Ford’s customer service division in over half of a century, is part of a clever plot to steer consumers toward the Blue Oval while capitalizing on the thriving parts industry. The United States imports nearly $150 billion in auto parts from China each year. Omicraft gives Ford the opportunity to take a stab at usurping some of that business for itself.

Considering that the average car has been on the road for eleven years now, rolling out this this brand is a minor stroke of genius.

Ten high-profile manufacturing executives, including Ford CEO Mark Fields and Tesla Motors’ Elon Musk, visited the White House today, where they were informed by President Donald Trump today that he would dramatically reduce corporate taxation and scale down regulations by as much as seventy-five percent.

Trump promised the return of manufacturing plants and jobs within the United States during his campaign. Making it more appetizing for specific companies to do so is an essential aspect of that plan, however, the new President also issued the caveat that companies choosing to invest outside of American soil would have to pay for it.

With the exception of funeral services and stylish clothing, practically anything can be purchased at your local Walmart. Well, that list now includes automobiles. North America’s largest retailer is edging is way into automotive sales with the help of the nation’s largest new-car dealership franchise, AutoNation.

Launching in April, Walmart’s CarSaver program will make it the perfect middleman for impulse car buyers and local dealerships. CarSaver is designed to allow shoppers to browse, select, finance, and insure a vehicle through its website or at kiosks positioned in outside of the nail salons and vision centers of twenty-five Walmart Supercenters.