Cars

At the 2016 Detroit Auto Show today, GM published all the specs of its upcoming Bolt EV (see below). The company finally confirmed that the vehicle will be equipped with a 60 kWh battery pack and that DC fast-charging will be available, but as an option.
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Chrysler unveiled at the Detroit Auto Show today the new 2017 Pacifica minivan with an option for a plug-in hybrid drivetrain. The “Pacifica Hybrid” is equipped with a 16 kWh battery pack which allows for an all-electric range of 30 miles, according to the automaker.
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VW head of electronic development Volkmar Tanneberger was at CES last week and revealed that the next generation all-electric e-Golf will see a roughly 30% increase in range, which should bring it to about 108 miles on a single charge.
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When Tesla CEO Elon Musk first announced the Gigafactory project, he said that even though the planned capacity of the factory is equal to the entire global production of lithium-ion batteries in 2013, the world would sill need around 200 more giant factories of similar size to support the auto industry’s transition from fossil fuels to electric.

Tesla named the factory in Nevada: “Gigafactory 1”, implying that the company plans to eventually introduce “Gigafactory 2” and so on. Late last year, German Vice-Chancellor and Economy Minister Sigmar Gabriel confirmed being in contact with Elon Musk over the possibility of building a battery factory in the country. Now we learn that Tesla is also reportedly in talks to build another Gigafactory in South Africa.
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After the well-documented release notes of the 7.1 update for the Model S and X Saturday, Tesla published a short blog update on Sunday and held a press conference to reveal its ambitions for the future of the ‘Summon’ feature, while Tesla CEO Elon Musk took to Twitter to describes what he calls the “first baby step” of the ‘Summon’ capability and its potential for the future.
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The new “Summon” feature received most of the attention after yesterday’s release of Tesla’s software v7.1, but the automaker also released ‘auto perpendicular parking’, which adds to the ‘auto parallel park’ feature Tesla released in October with the update v7.0.
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Tesla released today the version 7.1 of its software for the Model S and X. The new update includes everything we told you about when Tesla started testing the build with beta testers last month: UI improvements, a new self-parking feature, ‘Driver Mode’ and Autopilot restrictions, but the automaker is also introducing the “Summon” feature, which enables the Model S to drive itself without anyone in the car.
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In an interview with TechCrunch’s Matt Burns, Faraday Future SVP Nick Sampson had an honest moment and admitted that unveiling the FFZERO1 concept instead of their production car was to get people talking about the company and create a buzz.
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Tesla has a presence in Sweden since late 2013, but sales in the country have been lagging until mid-2015. Based on registration data, Tesla delivered only 268 Model S’s in Sweden in 2014, but last year the automaker delivered 996 cars, which represents a 271% increase.
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Tesla has now over 14,000 employees, but back in 2005, the automaker was employing less than one hundred workers and Dan Adams was one of them. Adams joined Tesla as a Senior Mechanical Engineer in 2005 and had a 10-year career at the company, making him one of the most senior engineers at the 12 year old “startup”.

We now learn that Adams recently left Tesla to join Skydio, a drone startup in stealth mode, which announced the closing of a $25 million financing round this week.
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Mitsubishi Motors confirmed that its popular Outlander PHEV plug-in hybrid will finally go on sales in the U.S. in August, or about 3 years after its initial launch.
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Mobileye, an Israel-based tech company, is quickly becoming the leader in driver assist and autonomous driving features. The company now boasts that 90% of automakers are using its products, and to leverage its popularity, Mobileye is launching a new mapping technology, which crowdsources real-time data from drivers and it hopes that automakers will share the data to create a constantly updating global digital map to guide self-driving cars in the future.
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Panasonic confirmed being a partner in Tesla’s battery factory early in the development of the project, but other than some estimates from Tesla, the electronic giant never committed to a dollar amount in investment until today.

Tesla made clear its plan to remain in control of the project and to contribute the majority of the estimated $4 billion to $5 billion investment required to build its massive battery factory. Panasonic confirmed today that it plans to invest between $1.5 billion and $1.6 billion in the Gigafactory.
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In December, the Tesla Model S not only outsold every other electric car in Denmark, but every single car model regardless of if they are gas-guzzling or battery-powered.

Tesla delivered 1,249 Model S’s in December in Denmark, easily beating the second best-selling vehicle; the Peugeot 208 with 903 vehicles sold during the month.
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After the mirrorless BMW i8, the German automaker unveiled an updated version of its i8 spyder at CES in Las Vegas, but the company has yet to offer any production timeline.
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Without even trying out (not available in US yet) a Gogoro scooter I love the idea. It is a 2-wheeled vehicle that runs on two Lithium battery packs which contain the same Panasonic 18650 batteries that line the bottom of the Tesla Model S and X. While a Model S contains about 7,000 of these to hit about 70-90kWh, the Gogoro’s battery packs are only 1.3kWh each (so around 100+batteries/ea) and can be exchanged in a charging bay. The 2.6kWh, according to Gogoro’s specs will take the good looking scooter about 60 miles at 60mph (0-31 in 4.2secs). While solid specs, that’s not at all what makes Gogoro a gamechanger…

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According to Tesla Senior Design Executive Franz von Holzhausen, Tesla first planned to unveil the Model 3, its upcoming mass market electric car, at the Detroit Auto Show 2015, but that deadline passed almost a year ago.

Last year, Tesla updated its timeline to March 2016 and EV enthusiasts are anxious to know if the automaker will stick to the new target. So far so good, a Tesla official confirmed today that the Model 3 is on track for a March unveiling.

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(Thanks to Zac Hall for images and video and checking out the back seats/CarPlay)

I have two electric cars at home – a plug-in Prius and a base model 2013 Tesla Model S. Yesterday, I drove the car that felt like their natural offspring: the compact crossover Chevy Bolt…
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Iron Man director Jon Favreau not only had the chance to get a personal walkthrough of the Model X with Tesla CEO Elon Musk just a few days after the unveiling of the vehicle, but he also arrived at the Star Wars: The Force Awakens premiere with Musk in his Founder series Model X VIN #1.
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Nissan released its December and 2015 sales reports for the U.S. and LEAF sales are down 42.8% in 2015 versus 2014. Until December, the company had the excuse of the upcoming 2016 models, which were affecting sales negatively, but the new cars arrived at dealerships last month and December was still a very disappointing month for Nissan’s all-electric vehicle.
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