Short Torque

Tesla charging tech wins Toyota client

Toyota, the world's largest automaker by sales, said on Thursday it had signed an agreement to adopt Tesla's electric vehicle charging technology from 2025. Ford, General Motors and Nissan are among automakers to adopt Tesla's North American Charging Standard, or NACS. It takes the Elon Musk-led company's superchargers closer to becoming the industry standard at the expense of the rival Combined Charging System. The Japanese automaker will incorporate Tesla's charging ports into certain Toyota and Lexus EVs, including the new Toyota SUV that will be assembled at its manufacturing plant in Kentucky. The US Department of Energy said Tesla's NACS makes up about 60 percent of fast chargers in the US. The rival CCS system is backed by automakers including Volkswagen, though the German company has held talks with Tesla about adopting the NACS.

NEVs boost car sales across Europe

New car sales in the European Union rose 9.2 percent in September, helped by a jump in sales of electric and hybrid vehicles, which together accounted for more than half of car sales that month, industry data showed on Friday. Sales of fully-electric cars rose 14.3 percent from 2022 and full hybrid sales were up more than 30 percent as the bloc recorded its 14th consecutive month of sales growth, according to the European Automobile Manufacturers' Association. Fully-electric cars made up 14.8 percent of sales. Together, fully-electric cars, plug-in hybrids and full hybrids accounted for more than 50 percent of sales, the data showed. Diesel models continued their slide to just 12.5 percent of sales, down from 15.9 percent in 2022. As recently as 2015, diesel vehicles comprised more than 50 percent of new car sales in the EU.

Market share tumbles for battery maker CATL

China's CATL, the world's largest battery maker for electric vehicles, saw its third-quarter profit rise 10.7 percent, its weakest quarter since the start of 2022 as slowing demand and stiff competition hit. This compared with a 63.2 percent increase in second-quarter profit and a 188.4 percent surge in the third quarter of 2022. CATL saw its China market share tumble in September to the lowest in more than a year, data showed, underscoring the challenges it faces from smaller rivals and weakening demand in the world's largest EV market. CATL's market share by battery installations in China-made EVs dropped to 39 percent in September, the lowest since June 2022 and down from 45 percent three months earlier, data from the China Automotive Battery Innovation Alliance showed, as rivals accelerated supplies. Second-ranked BYD and third-placed CALB both boosted their shipments in China by more than 71 percent in the first nine months of this year, far outpacing CATL's 18.8 percent growth, according to the data.

Automakers agree on asset transfer deal

China's Dongfeng Motor Group and Stellantis said on Thursday that the automakers will expand their vehicle and component export business through an asset sale to capture the burgeoning China auto market. Under the asset transfer deal, State-owned Dongfeng will buy land use-rights and buildings in Wuhan and Xiangyang from Dongfeng Peugeot Citroen Automobile, its joint venture with Stellantis, for 1.71 billion yuan ($233.69 million). Meanwhile, Stellantis has agreed to continue producing Peugeot and Citroen cars with Dongfeng in the Chinese plants and exporting Peugeot 4008 and Peugeot 5008 SUVs to ASEAN countries, and the Citroen C5X station wagon to Europe. The carmaker, which sees its future as a niche player in China, closed its joint venture that makes Jeeps with Guangzhou Automobile Group in 2022 as sales of the brand slumped amid intensifying competition in the world's largest auto market.

Motoring - Agencies