Gas Forever

I've been making the case for some time now that our best bet for sustainable mobility in the future is to commit to a gas-powered economy now and over the long-term, pushing improvements to mileage and emissions as we go. Looks as if The Wall Street Journal has gotten the message.

Czar-mania

My latest piece for Slate's new business site, The Big Money. This time, I'm assessing former journalist and much-envied investment banker Steve Rattner as Obama's car czar candidate.

Fisker, "Success," and Vapor-ride-sation

Yahoo Finance spit this out today, but it's re-purposed from BizWeek. The topline is that there were some successful startups amid the carnage that was finance in 2008. Among them, Fisker Automotive.

OK, Fisker might amount to something. Someday. But I was scratching my head at the following listing:

Fisker Automotive

Irvine, Calif.
Founders: Henrik Fisker and Bernhard Koehler
VC investment over the last four quarters: $90.5 million

Henrik Fisker and Bernhard Koehler met at BMW, where both worked as auto designers (Fisker is credited with designing the Z8). In 2007, they founded Fisker to build plug-in hybrid luxury cars, with the goal of selling to car buyers who want to improve their impact on the environment but not have to make a compromise when it comes to style. The 45-employee company, which is still in the development stage, is predicting the recession will improve by midyear 2009 and that consumers will be turning to eco-friendly cars for good, explains Fisker spokesperson Russell Datz.

"...still in the development stage...predicting the recession will improve by midyear 2009...consumers will be turning to econ-friendly cars for good..." And by gumption, when Fisker gets out of the development stage and the recessions clears and consumers make the final switch, it's...sure to be the luxe-statement Fisker sleds they go for!

What gibberish! The whole friggin' thing was written off whatever Russell Datz supplied. Note as well that if BizWeek's numbers are correct, and if $90.5 bil is what Fisker has burned so far, then they are FAR from the average cost of developing a new vehicle, much less a paradigm-busting exotic EV.

A New Business Model for Cars--The Model T!

So new it's old! I have a new piece
up on The Big Money. I'm calling for the development of a new automotive business model based on a more versatile product--effectively, a new Model T--than what's currently being offered by the Big Three (e.g., Chevy Volt), the Japanese, or all the new EV startups (some of which are struggling).

$15 Billlion Is Pathetic--Now More Than Ever You Need to Buy American

It looks as if a kick-the-can bailout of the Detroit Big Three is about a done deal. Still, that's about $10 billion less than what they were (a) asking for (b) originally promised under a pre-financial crisis plan to retool their plants to produce cars that would deliver higher fuel efficiency. It's almost $25 billion less than the revised figure that they floated last week. I mean, let's call a duck a duck here: $15 bil gets GM and Chrysler to maybe next spring, at which point they can revive merger discussions. By then, Ford should be feeling the pinch, as well.

Contrast these figure with the hundreds-of-billions in cash suck the financial sector, which played roulette with subprime mortgages, is getting. The financial sector, such as it remains, is selling goo. Gunky funky garbage-y goo designed to endow the seventh homes of hedge fund helmers and to line the bespoke pockets of MBAs who swaggered into Wall Street investment banks with visions of mega-bonuses dancing in their heads. There's no meaningful future in this gunk, just as their has been no profit in trading equities in a normal market since, oh, I don't know, 1964. It's bubble-bubble-bubble now, with a Federal Reserve horror of inflation jacking the system, a program has delivered nothing so much as the more feared inverse, deflation. Too much money chasing too few goods? Yeah, how about no money chasing bottomless excess inventory.

And sooooo...what's afoot now, exactly? Looks like a last-ditch conservative putsch to bankrupt the Big Three so that the UAW can be done away with forever. The Big Three may actually be on baord with this. But as far as an endgame goes, it means more $15-an-hour, disposable contract labor in right-to-work Southern states, building Toyotas and BMWs, and A LOT less $50-an-hour unionized workers in the Upper Midwest.

Forget about the vanquished opportunity to get the taxpayer into a Green deal with the domestic automakers. This paltry bailout is more of a stay of execution. Let's hope the new administration comes into Washington with a more courageous industrial policy. As it stands, this is a sad day to be an American and love cars.

L.A. Auto Show for The Big Money

Here's my take on the L.A. Auto Show for Slate's new site The Big Money. The event actually wasn't as depressing as I thought it would be--but it was certainly depressing (although on balance not as bad as the pre-meltdown New York Auto Show back in March). Main story was that Ford, with more money in the bank than GM and Chrysler, and with more Green cars, rolled out a more dramatic presence. Check back later for pictures from the show.

Hufffington Post: Save the SUVs, Then Kill Them

It's hard to say that Detroit betting big--and winning big--on SUVs and trucks for a decade was a bad plan. When gas was cheap, tons of money was raked in by the Big Three. Small cars have always had crummy profit margins, and if you add on the cost of making small cars highly fuel-efficient, you erode profits even further. BUT--the time has come to make a serious change. Unfortunately, Detroit still needs SUV and truck profits to get it there. At least for the short term. Here's my take, from the Huffington Post.