This was probably inevitable after Kitty Hawk, the ambitious “flying car” startup funded by Google co-founder Larry Page, shut down last year. Wisk was formed in 2019 as a joint venture with Kitty Hawk and aerospace giant Boeing, so without Kitty Hawk, Boeing had the choice to either cut off funding for Wisk completely or acquire the startup. It went with option B.
[The Air Current]
The British automaker issued a recall for 6,400 electric I-PACE vehicles due to fire risks from an over-heated battery. Included in that recall is an undisclosed number of driverless Waymo vehicles. A spokesperson for the company said it was working with Jaguar on a software update that should fix the issue.
Car dealers are some of the richest, weirdest, most politically powerful, hard partying, and conservative people in the United States. They are also in complete denial about the increasing popularity of electric vehicles, according to this endlessly fascinating story in Slate. Case in point: over two-thirds of dealerships don’t have any EVs on the lot. Slate went to Texas for the annual dealership convention, NADA, which was suffuse with existential angst about battery-powered cars.
So there it was: Dealers stand between many electric cars and most American car buyers, but they aren’t just going to lay down and let some zero-emissions playthings roll them over. Some, I heard over and over, would rather not deal than deal with someone else’s dictates.
VW is teasing the three-row version of its electric Microbus ahead of its official reveal next week. This is the version that will go on sale in North America in 2024. (The two-row version is currently available in Europe — look out for Thomas Ricker’s review this weekend in The Verge!) And while there’s not much to look at here — just some headlights, really — the longer Buzz is sure to generate some, well, buzz, especially among #Vanlife aficionados and families. You can watch the livestream of the debut here on June 2nd.
