The future of transportation is electric. Tesla proved with the Model S that customers would want to buy luxury vehicles powered by lithium-ion batteries. Other EV startups like Faraday Future, Byton, Lucid Motors, and SF Motors are chasing after Elon Musk. And major automakers like Jaguar, Audi, and Mercedes-Benz have each released their own Tesla challengers. There are obstacles, such as the need for a more robust charging network. But battery-powered cars are here to stay.
Karpathy, who had also been on the founding team of OpenAI, says he will be working on R&D at Anthropic. Previously, he had been working on “new kind of school that is AI native,” and he says he’s still “deeply passionate about education” and plans to go back to it “in time.”
A bipartisan bill that was just introduced in the House would levy an annual fee of $130 on everyone who owns an electric vehicle. The reasoning is that EV owners need to help pay for road and infrastructure improvements, since they don’t pay the gas tax that funds the Highway Trust Fund. But EV advocates are miffed that they’re being asked to pay almost twice what the average car owner pays each year in gas taxes, especially at a time when high gas prices are leading some consumers to give EVs a new look.
First teased in 2023, this ID. Polo GTI is the first EV in the GTI brand’s 50-year history, launching in Germany this fall for “just under” €39,000, and probably never in the US. It features a 52kWh battery with a max range of 424 km (263 miles). Volkswagen says the electric GTI can accelerate up to 100km/hr in 6.8 seconds.
That means we won’t get an all-electric Mazda until 2029 at the earliest. The Japanese automaker also plans on slashing its investment in EVs to ¥1.2 trillion ($7.52 billion) through 2030, down from an earlier budget of ¥2.0 trillion ($12.53 billion), the CEO told Automotive News. I guess it could have been worse; Mazda could have gone full Honda and cancelled everything.
While some automakers are pulling back on EVs, others are embracing them. Four years after the launch of the Cadillac Lyriq, the GM-owned brand is selling more EVs than ever. In addition to the Lyriq, there’s also the Optiq, Vistiq, and Escalade IQ. (And don’t forget the bespoke $360,000 Celestiq.) Moreover, three-quarters of customers buying new EVs are conquests from other brands, particularly Tesla, Mercedes-Benz, Audi, Lexus, and BMW.
[Cadillac]
As noticed by Automotive News, the Little Tike Cozy Coupe — yes, the classic red and yellow toy car that has delighted children for over 40 years — is going zero-emission. Little Tikes recently introduced the Cozy E-Charging Station ($33) for the Cozy Coupe’s theoretical EV battery. Now your kid can simulate standing around for 45 minutes to an hour waiting for their EV to recharge. Fortunately I don’t think there’s an app that goes along with it. And no word on the E-Charging Station’s charging speeds. Probably slower than BYD’s.
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The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is testing advanced driver assist systems, and the first vehicle to receive passing grades is the 2026 Model Y. The vehicle was inspected in four categories: pedestrian automatic emergency braking; lane keeping assistance; blind spot warning; and blind spot intervention. These pass/fail tests have recently been added to the agency’s New Car Assessment Program. NHTSA Administrator Jonathan Morrison said that the Model Y demonstrated “lifesaving potential of driver assistance technologies and sets a high bar for the industry.”
The EV company, which just had a relatively good quarter, is apparently working on some interesting new projects. In an interview with Reuters, CEO RJ Scaringe said the company has “other variants” of the R2 that it hasn’t shown publicly, including a pickup truck version and a sportier R2X model. Rivian is also considering building its own lidar, perhaps in partnership with a Chinese company. The company is planning on adding lidar to the R2 later this year as part of a big shift into autonomous vehicles.
In an earnings call last month, Elon Musk was feeling bullish that Full Self-Driving (Supervised) would soon be authorized in the European Union, especially after the Level 2 automated system was approved for use in the Netherlands. But according to emails seen by Reuters, EU regulators are in no rush to give the green light. They have issues with FSD, including “the system’s tendency to speed, whether it is safe to use on icy roads and drivers’ ability to circumvent features designed to prevent cell-phone use.”
Unibodies, zonal architecture, shorter wiring harnesses. Ford is resorting to proven manufacturing techniques to get its EV costs down.
No courtroom updates today, but we have updated our rundown of the evidence with the latest exhibits added in Elon v. Musk, including details of the donated Tesla Model 3s.
Eight months after the iOS app launched, Tesla has released an Android version of its Robotaxi app. The service expanded to Houston and Dallas last week, but still seems to only have a small number of vehicles actually on the road.
[Google Play]
It’s slightly smaller than the full Cayenne EV, and costs a little bit less, with a starting price of $116,000 that can be specced all the way up to $170,000 for the top trim. It can do 0-60mph in 2.4 seconds while putting out 1,141 horsepower. And it’s 113 kWh battery offers up to 350 miles of range, with a peak charging speed of 400 kW.
The storm struck Friday evening, causing damage to one of the buildings in Rivian’s facility. A photo posted on Reddit showed the inside of Building 2 with the roof partially collapsed. No one was injured, and in an email to staff, Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe said the building will be back up and running this week:
While Building 2 has sustained damage and is closed for the time being as we complete our assessments, I am incredibly relieved to share that there were no injuries at our plant. We anticipate resuming operations in Building 2 this week. Operations at other facilities continue as planned.
According to Autotrader data spotted by The Guardian, new EVs now cost on average £785 (about $1,065) less than gas cars. The UK’s EV grant, its zero-emission vehicle mandate, and more competition from brands like BYD have helped drive down prices, reducing a major barrier to EV adoption.
Reporting from Bloomberg on how many Cybertrucks Elon’s other companies have been buying:
SpaceX, the Musk-led rocket and satellite maker, accounted for 1,279 — or more than 18% — of the 7,071 Cybertrucks registered in the US during the fourth quarter, according to registration data that S&P Global Mobility provided to Bloomberg News. The billionaire’s other ventures acquired another 60 vehicles during those months.
The iX is the latest EV to meet an untimely death in America, where policy decisions are propelling us backward rather than forwards. But discontinuing the iX — first reported by BMW Blog (we love it when an enthusiast blog breaks news ) — isn’t the end of BMW’s EV journey in the US. The German automaker is shifting to its next-gen Neue Klasse platform, with the new iX3 set to arrive in just a few months.
