Welcome to the Daily 5 report for Monday, March 17.
It's not quite as remarkable as a General Motors-Ford cooperation, but a report today says American Honda plans to procure batteries for its hybrid vehicles from rival Toyota Motor North America's new $13.9 billion battery complex coming on line in Liberty, N.C.
As we've noted before, the Japanese are grappling with the threat of new U.S. tariffs quietly with little drama. This arrangement, if confirmed, would signal that even rivals Toyota and Honda are shrewd enough to combine efforts to avoid tariffs.
Nikkei said Honda will take in Toyota's U.S.-made batteries for about 400,000 vehicles, which is enough for all of the hybrid cars it sells in the U.S. starting in fiscal 2025, which begins in April.
A spokesman for Toyota Motor North America would not confirm the report, but told Automotive News: "We are constantly evaluating our competitiveness and making decisions to support our North American operations, helping to ensure our promise of long-term employment stability. We do not comment on single transactions and have nothing to announce at this time."
As our Larry P. Vellequette reports, the first production batteries from Toyota's 1,800-acre, 30 gigawatt-hour battery complex are expected to come off the first production line this spring. The massive facility, which Automotive News toured a year ago, will produce two sizes of battery cells — a cell phone-size unit for traditional hybrids and a VHS tape-size for plug-in hybrids.
The complex is expected to be complete by 2028 and employ an estimated 5,100 people, with seven buildings and two production lines planned for each: Ten lines will build battery packs for future electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids, while four lines will build battery packs for gasoline-electric hybrids.
Speaking of batteries, this report about EV maker BYD in China should raise some eyebrows in the engineering community.
BYD launched an upgraded platform for EVs with a 1,000-volt architecture that it said could charge vehicles as fast as pumping gas. Reuters reported that BYD founder Wang Chuanfu said at an event livestreamed March 17 from the company's Shenzhen headquarters that vehicles powered by the super e-platform with peak charging speeds of 1,000 kilowatts can travel 400 kilometers (249 miles) on a five-minute charge.
In another significant move for BYD, the Chinese EV giant is considering Germany for a possible third assembly plant in Europe, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters, after the region's biggest economy and car market opposed European Union tariffs on China-made EVs last year.
Meanwhile, U.S. vehicle software supplier Applied Intuition is landing more business from Volkswagen Group's commercial vehicle subsidiary Traton, which inked a strategic partnership that will speed development of software-defined trucks. The Mountain View, Calif., firm will provide all of Traton's brands with vehicle operating systems and a developer tool chain, the companies said. The companies have worked together on driver-assist automated driving systems for the past five years, as Pete Bigelow reports.
Looking ahead to Tuesday's report, look for a story about emerging brake-by-wire technology. It's another chapter in the developing world of software-defined vehicles.
That's it for now. Have a great rest of your day.
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— Philip Nussel, online editor
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