Good morning! It is Wednesday, May 8, 2024, and this is The morning shift, your daily roundup of the biggest automotive headlines from around the world, in one place. Here are the important stories you need to know.
1st Gear: NHTSA opens investigation into Tesla Autopilot recall
Tesla can’t catch a break right now. Unless Layoffs sweep across the company and gut Departments like Superchargerthen it is declining profits and regulatory investigations into the security of its software. Now it’s the latter that’s once again taking a hit on the American electric vehicle maker, as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration demands answers about the safety of Tesla’s Autopilot and fully self-driving systems.
NHTSA has launched an investigation Tesla’s recall of its installed cars with Autopilot and Full Self-Drive, which caused a software patch to be issued that affected almost every car sold in America. Now federal regulators have “several concerns” about the handling of the recall. As Reuters reports:
The NHTSA recall investigation affects U.S. Y,
Tesla, which did not immediately respond to a request for comment, has repeatedly said that Autopilot does not make vehicles self-driving and is intended for use by a fully attentive driver who is ready to take over and has their hands on the steering wheel.
The NHTSA said it sent Tesla an information request letter, released Tuesday, requesting recall details and documents by July 1.
NHTSA wants Tesla to provide comparative data on vehicle performance after receiving the recall, including the number of steering wheel warnings issued.
Concerns have been raised with federal regulators after 20 accidents involving Tesla models equipped with the advanced driver assistance technology. NHTSA also tested drive-through cars Tesla’s own solution to the recalled problemsand investigators still found problems with the cars.
This is about the way the driver activates the assistance technology, with the owner being able to choose whether the software is activated by pulling the drive lever once or twice. NHTSA has also done this before called on the car manufacturer to make improvements the driver intervention systems used during Autopilot operation, with the current system opening up the possibility of a “critical safety vulnerability,” Reuters reports.
2nd Gear: Rvian Losses Mount as Plant Expansion Begins
Tesla is not that just electric vehicle startup However, that is difficult. Rivian has now admitted that the company’s losses are mounting as it begins preparing to turn around its factory the introduction of a fleet of new models.
The automaker has slowed production at its Illinois plant as it prepares to retool the plant. Reports Automotive News. However, there are costs associated with setting up the facility to produce new products Models like R2 and R3, announced in March, hurt the company’s bottom line. As Automotive News explained:
Rivian Automotive said its first-quarter net loss widened to $1.45 billion amid a major retooling of its Normal, Illinois, plant, as sales fell to $1.2 billion compared to the same period last year almost doubled.
The automaker’s net loss in its latest quarter was 7 percent higher than the same period a year earlier, while revenue rose to $661 million, the company said Tuesday.
Rivian shares fell 6 percent to $9.63 in after-hours trading.
The slowdown in Production at the Normal, IL plant has enabled Rivian to completely retool the facility, which included installing new robots and entering into contracts with new parts suppliers to reduce costs and increase line speed. As a result, Rivian expects to assemble 57,000 vehicles at the facility this year.
So far this year 13,588 R1t and R1S models delivered to customers, which corresponds to an increase of 71 percent compared to the same period last year.
3rd Gear: Billions are being poured into another self-driving startup
Everyone keeps saying that self-driving cars will be the future once they learn how to do it Navigate intersections and traffic cones and angry locals. Well, there is a new billion-dollar investment in a self-driving startup that hopes to turn that vision into reality.
The British startup Wayve has just been handed over more than a billion dollars in funding its mission to bring self-driving cars to the world’s roads, reports the BBC. Support comes from well-known technology companies such as Microsoft, as the BBC explains:
It is the largest known investment in an AI company in Europe to date. Wayve says the funding will allow it to help build the autonomous cars of the future.
Wayve is developing technology that will power future self-driving vehicles using so-called “embodied AI.”
Unlike AI models that perform cognitive or generative tasks such as answering questions or creating images, this new technology interacts with and learns from real-world environments and environments.
The financing was led by investment bank Softbank and includes $1.05 billion in backing from companies including Microsoft. At the moment, the autonomous vehicle startup has a fleet of electrified Jaguar I-Pace and Mustang Mach-E vehicles operating in cities across the UK.
4th gear: Boeing pushes back Starliner launch
Let’s round out the news this morning with something a little further from home, or at least something, that should get a little further away from home. Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft was scheduled to take off from a launch site in the United States yesterday, but the launch was canceled at the last minute due to problems with the rocket that was supposed to carry the mission into orbit.
The The Starliner’s launch was supposed to be the first manned mission to use the probe, which has been in development at Boeing for years. As NBC News explains:
Boeing’s Starliner capsule was scheduled to launch from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida on its first crewed test flight at 10:34 p.m. ET. NASA astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita Williams were aboard the capsule and strapped in when the launch attempt was aborted, about two hours before the scheduled liftoff.
NASA announced early Tuesday that a second attempt would not occur until Friday at the earliest.
Mission controllers declared Monday’s launch a “scrub” after detecting an anomaly on a valve on the United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V rocket that was supposed to fly the Starliner capsule into orbit.
The Atlas V rocket Starliner should take off on was also developed by Boeing, but built in collaboration with aerospace company Lockheed Martin. Experts will now inspect the rocket before a second launch attempt can be made. NBC News reports that they need to decide whether a pressure control valve on the rocket’s upper stage needs to be replaced.