Volvo Cars is not in great shape. After posting record sales and profits last year, the Swedish automaker is going into a cost-cutting frenzy to try to stay on top of its game. That’s because the results for this year’s first quarter are in, and it’s bad.

In short, everything was in the red when compared to the same period last year. Revenue was down 11.7%, the operating income (excluding joint ventures and associates) was down 72%, while the total operating income decreased by 59%. Meanwhile, global vehicle sales dropped by 6%, reaching 172,219 units.

To try and make things better, Volvo is kicking off massive cost-cutting efforts totaling $1.87 billion (SEK 18 billion). The cuts will include layoffs and a larger decrease in investment than originally planned. The company has also withdrawn its financial guidance for the next two years while it tries to figure out the impact of slowing sales, impending tariffs and model launches.

What Else Is Volvo Up To These Days

“The automotive industry is in the middle of a very difficult period with challenges not seen before,” said Håkan Samuelsson, Volvo Cars CEO. “Over the last few weeks, I have worked with the management team and other colleagues on a plan to make the company stronger and more resilient. While our strategy is clear, we must get better at delivering results.”

Volvo said its plan’s bulk of effects will be seen in 2026. That said, the cost cuts are not the only changes coming. The automaker will restructure its operations in the United States by creating a new sales region called Americas, which includes the U.S., Canada and the markets in Latin America. Mike Cottone, Volvo’s head of U.S. and Canada operations, will step down after almost 20 years with the company, while Luis Rezende will lead the new Americas region.

Furthermore, the Swedish automaker is relegating European operations to the bottom of the priorities list, while focusing more on the new Americas region and Greater China. Meanwhile, the last region on the list is called Europe & Rest of the World.

Speaking of China, Volvo plans on launching its first extended-range plug-in hybrid model here soon. The model was first announced back in February, when the automaker outlined its product plan for this year, which includes the EX30 Cross Country, ES90 and the refreshed S90.

Last month, Volvo Cars ousted CEO Jim Rowan and replaced him with industry heavyweight Håkan Samuelsson, who served as CEO before Rowan. Samuelsson was at the helm of the Swedish company when the Scalable Product Architecture (SPA) platform came to life. The architecture has been the base for nearly all of Volvo’s products for the past decade, including the XC90 and XC60 SUVs, as well as the S60 and S90 sedans.

The graveyard of EV startups is already crowded. And that list could get even longer if America continues with its hostile trade policies. Building a new car company in this economy takes guts. But it’s also true that the EV industry is only now starting to explore the true potential of electric powertrains. Luckily, some startups are counter-programming. Instead of chasing giant, heavy, six-figure electric trucks, they’re aiming for options that are compact, lightweight and affordable.

California-based upstart Telo reached a crucial milestone in March after building its first prototype MT1 electric truck. It has the footprint of a Mini Cooper SE, the bed length of a Toyota Tacoma and battery capacity similar to that of a Tesla Model S. Its CEO Jason Marks claims that it can seat four 6’2” passengers inside. On paper, it sounds great. In Jay Leno’s latest video, Marks revealed that the Telo was inspired by Japanese Kei trucks.

Japan’s Kei trucks are tiny, lightweight utility vehicles that are rugged, cheap to run, easy to fix and versatile. They’re built for tight areas and are super maneuverable—the exact opposite of all modern American trucks. Honda, Nissan, Subaru and Mitsubishi all have their own Kei trucks and even Americans love them. According to Japanese Used Motor Vehicle data cited by Hagerty, Americans imported some 7,500 kei trucks in 2023. That number climbed to nearly 10,000 units in 2024, Marks said.

Our colleagues at Motor1 even published a fantastic feature on Kei trucks last year. According to federal regulations, foreign car imports that are 25 years or older are allowed in the U.S., but their registration depends on individual states. And while some states have blocked such imports—deeming them unsafe for American streets full of hulking SUVs and trucks—most places still allow you to register these things. Many Americans have done just that.

Telo wants to build an American truck for these types of buyers. And the timing can’t be more ripe—automotive imports risk getting hammered from Trump’s tariffs right now.

Plus, the Insurance Institute For Highway Safety (IIHS) has said that bigger SUVs and trucks tend to be safer for occupants but more dangerous for pedestrians due to their sheer size and weight.

“Trucks are killing pedestrians,” Marks said in Leno's video. “I don’t think it’s a good thing to have 5-foot tall hoods and we want to prevent this from happening.”

Telo’s tiny team of just 11 engineers has built two fully functioning prototypes. They claim to have developed a proprietary battery packaging technology, squeezing a 106 kilowatt-hour pack into the truck’s floor using 2170 cells from an undisclosed supplier. (For context, a Mini Cooper SE’s pack is just 54.2 kWh.) It also has a Rivian-like storage tunnel under the rear seats and the Tesla-developed NACS charging port neatly integrated into the rear left taillight.

Small size doesn’t mean small performance. That’s where advantages of an electric powertrain show up. The Telo truck is claimed to deliver 350 miles of range and 500 horsepower from its dual-motor all-wheel-drive set-up. That means 0-60 miles per hour in just 4 seconds. There's also a 300 hp single motor version. And the utility aspect is impressive on paper, with a 5-foot-long standard bed, expandable to 8 feet after dropping the midgate, GMC Sierra EV and Chevy Avalanche-style.

The entry-level MT1 is expected to start at $41,500 and could drop to the mid $30,000s with the federal and state tax credits if those stick around.

It’s a cool concept with real mass market appeal. But Telo has some big challenges to solve first, like meeting crash safety standards. Unlike the old Japanese Kei trucks, this EV will need to have a sizable front crumple zone, which isn't apparent with the current design. (The company maintains that it will pass crash tests). And then hitting that price target with a U.S.-made battery and components would be another big roadblock.

Unless you’ve got Saudi money or giant government loans, making it as a newcomer in this space can be brutal. Even century-old brands are struggling to make compelling EVs. But if you want to succeed, Telo is wise to recognize that you have to do something different.

Have a tip? Contact the author: suvrat.kothari@insideevs.com

Related Stories

Foxconn—yes, the same company that builds the iPhone you might be reading this on—is gearing up to become a real player in the American EV market. And just like its gig with Apple, the company plans to build the product while letting someone else market and sell it.

The Taiwanese tech giant recently announced that it's prepping its first U.S.-market EV for sale, the Foxtron Model C. But don't get it twisted, because you're not going to see a "Model C" on dealer lots. Instead, it'll take advantage of a long-standing auto industry workaround, contract manufacturing, to put the Model C up for sale under some yet-to-be-named mystery brand. Think Fisker Ocean–produced by Magna—but hopefully a lot better.

News of the Model C launching stateside under another automaker comes from Jun Seki, the former Nissan exec that now steers Foxconn's EV unit. According to a report from Automotive News, Seki confirmed that the brand's intentions during a sideline conversation at the Taipei Mobility Mega Show.

Here's the scoop from Automotive News:

The company has a U.S. client, and the customer will start selling the Model C this year, he said.

Seki declined to name the customer, keeping with Foxconn’s canon of confidentiality as a contract manufacturer. But the U.S.-spec crossover grabbing eyeballs at this month’s Taiwan 360° Mobility Mega Show foreshadows what’s in store. It has a wavy side crease, funky hood air vent, wraparound headlamps, panoramic sunroof and huge vertical infotainment screen.

Indeed, Foxconn is jumping into the international auto industry amid swirling speculation it will get a big lift by partnering with Nissan Motor Co., Honda Motor Co., Mitsubishi Motors Corp., or even a combination of all three, to work on next-generation software-defined EVs.

Here's the kicked: The Model C is already on sale elsewhere in the world thanks to the magic of badge engineering. In Foxconn's home market of Taiwan, it's sold as the Luxgen n7. But in a world where geopolitical tensions and tariffs are causing waves of news every single day, it's unlikely that Foxconn would just import the Taiwanese-built Model C into the U.S., right?

Right. That's why it's setting up shop at an old manufacturing plant in Lordstown, Ohio. Yep, that's the exact same plant where General Motors used to build the Chevy Cavalier, Cobalt and a myriad of other GM models stemming way back to the late 1960s (like the Chevy Bel Air, Impala and others). GM sold the plant to the now-defunct Lordstown Motors, who sold the plant to manufacturing partner Foxconn in 2022.

Foxconn has wanted to get into the EV game for a while. It makes sense, too, considering the company's insane supply chain capabilities: batteries, electronics, EV motors. Hell, it already makes half of the components you need to build an EV, anyway. That means blank slate to full product on a schedule that most OEMs could only dream of.

It's not clear what brand Foxconn has lined up to sell its Model C stateside just yet. Foxconn has already tapped Mitsubishi to sell its Model B in Australia, though neither brand has formally announced any such news for the U.S. market. All we know is that Foxconn says it has a U.S. customer that plans to sell the Model C later this year and that its factory could pump out an annual volume of nearly half-a-million cars per year (plus some all-electric farm tractors). For context, that's more vehicles than BMW produced at its Spartanburg assembly plant, which leads the U.S. as the largest automotive exporter by value.

Given how messy, expensive and uncertain EV production has become lately, don't be too surprised if other OEMs start looking to letting Foxconn into the henhouse. More and more automakers are looking to domesticate production of vehicles thanks to tariffs, so something like contract manufacturing could be a big hit for brands like Foxconn—at least in the short-term.

More Foxconn News

New York wants to be a leader in electrification. With an economy that's larger than Canada's and a relatively wealthy, relatively progressive population, you'd think the EV transition would come easy. There's certainly plenty of money behind it. But there's only one issue, one that sits at the center of so many problems in this country: Money in politics.

Anyone who believes that corporate money can't overrule public opinion has never gone up against car dealership lobbyists. Long before Tesla was perceived by many as public enemy number one, long before the Department of Government Efficiency, there was the David vs. Goliath battle at the center of the Tesla story. Most states had laws explicitly crafted by car dealers to avoid competition from manufacturers, and they weren't going away without a fight. Some even wrote new laws to keep Tesla out.

Over a decade after the battle started, it's still raging today. And it's not a red-state thing. The next battleground may just be New York.

New York State Senator Patricia Fahy just fired the first shot, arguing in an interview with the New York Times that the state should revoke Tesla's ability to run company stores in the state.

Some background: New York was one of the states that didn't have a law banning direct-to-consumer sales, but passed one as Tesla started to threaten the car dealership cabal in the Empire State. Despite consumers largely preferring direct-to-consumer brands' pricing transparency, despite it being a viable competitive model to the franchise model and despite Tesla having no franchise agreements, the state banned the practice entirely.

To be clear: There is no remotely plausible reason why companies selling direct-to-consumer is dangerous, bad or anti-competitive. That's why you can buy your phone at an Apple Store, or at Best Buy. It's fine. 

More Dealer news

The law carved out one exception. Tesla already had five stores open in the state, so it would be allowed to keep them. That means that as Tesla has grown from a tiny upstart to the most valuable automaker in the world, it has had to service the entire two-trillion-dollar economy of New York State with just five storefronts. That restriction is not only bad for Tesla, it's even worse for upstarts like Rivian and Lucid, which haven't been able to open any stores in New York. That's a direct result of New York's anti-competitive dealer protective law, prompted and protected by its powerful network of powerful car dealers.

The result is that Tesla has both a direct-sales monopoly and zero opportunity for growth. Unbelievably, Senator Fahy—a Democrat—is trying to blame Tesla for this result. Following CEO Elon Musk's dismantling of federal institutions, she's pushing to shut the company out of the state.

Mr. Musk, she told the New York Times, is “part of an administration that is killing all the grant funding for electric vehicle infrastructure, killing wind energy, killing anything that might address climate change. Why should we give them a monopoly?” 

She's so close to getting it, but somehow avoids the bigger sin: Why on Earth is New York handing out artificial monopolies to anything? While she proposes giving Tesla's five licenses to rivals like Lucid, Rivian and Scout Motors, that idea is continuing the same broken practice of allowing the state to pick winners and losers. The dealers give us jobs and money, so they win. Tesla is the enemy, so they lose. Rivian, Lucid and Scout have done nothing so far, so they get the scraps, but with the awareness that New York can revoke their special license whenever their CEO pisses off a Senator.

It's a rotten, dirty solution to a rotten, dirty problem. New York is picking a fight with Tesla again, and it's consumers who always end up losing.

Contact the author: Mack.hogan@insideevs.com. 

Zeekr is a premium Chinese automaker, one of over a dozen sub-brands that belong to Geely, and it wants to rival the established luxury brands in all segments. It offers cars as small as a Tesla Model 3. But with its most recently revealed model, the 9X, it also hopes to draw buyers away from the Mercedes-Benz GLS or a BMW X7. The 9X is also Zeekr's first plug-in hybrid (PHEV), marking a huge shift for a company that has long been all-electric.

There’s certainly more than a hint of Rolls-Royce about the 9X’s front end, with a very similar grille design and squared-off aesthetic. However, it doesn’t look like a copy of the Cullinan SUV, and moving more to the side of the vehicle, it doesn’t look like any of its rivals. The polished metal trim that goes all the way around the upper part of the vehicle’s sides doesn’t look overdone, and it helps make the three-row 9X look special.

What’s more intriguing is what's under the 9X’s hood. It has a 275 horsepower 2-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine connected to a three-speed automatic gearbox. The engine also acts as a generator to replenish the battery pack (whose capacity hasn’t been confirmed yet), giving the 9X a claimed range of 236 miles (380 km) on the more lenient Chinese test cycle (CLTC). 

The combined power output from its two electric motors and combustion engine is around 885 horsepower, which enables this big bruiser to accelerate to 62 mph (100 km/h) in a claimed three seconds and reach a top speed of 149 mph (240 km/h).

Thanks to its 900-volt electrical architecture, the 9X can charge from 20 to 80% in 9 minutes. It also has a 48-volt system running all of the ancillaries, including the two-chamber air suspension that works together with active antiroll bars to help it corner flat. Zeekr says the 9X is also capable of Level 3 automated driving, featuring an advanced array of driver assistance systems that rely on lidar and cameras.

Zeekr could have made the 9X pure electric, but that would have severely limited its appeal. Customers who want big, flashy, three-row SUVs like this one typically want a lot of range, but extra large vehicles require extra large batteries, which drive up prices. Even in China, where charging networks are good and expanding rapidly, PHEVs make sense in the largest segments.

Zeekr could also have made the 9X a extended-range electric vehicle (EREV), with a combustion engine acting solely as a generator. However, even though plug-ins (EVs and PHEVs) are hugely popular in China, EREVs are few and far between. One of the few range-extended EVs coming out of China that we know of is the BYD Shark pickup. Pretty much all of the other hybrids tend to have engines that power the wheels directly. 

If you want a fancy battery-powered Zeekr and don’t need the SUV form factor, you can opt for the company’s BEV minivan, the 009, which in its top trim has actual gold-plated exterior trim and a lavish two-seat cinema in the back. We also recently got to try what is expected to become the company’s biggest seller in Europe, the 7X, which surprised us with its luxurious and well-appointed interior, smooth ride and general feeling of good engineering. Clearly, Zeekr has a lot of good things going on. 

More On Zeekr

Nearly a quarter of U.S. auto manufacturing capacity sat idle at the end of last year. But firing up that extra space isn’t so easy. Some automakers have more flexibility than others and many affordable EVs and gas cars built abroad can’t just be made in the U.S. without losing their cost edge. Extra factory space won’t extinguish the tariff fire.

Welcome back to Critical Materials, your daily round-up of news and events shaping up the world of electric cars and technology. Also on the radar today: President Trump’s tariffs might make China’s auto market even stronger and Japanese automakers are teaming up with Chinese software giants in order to remain relevant in the region.

30%: U.S. Car Plants With Excess Capacity, And Those Without It

Some U.S. automakers are already pushing their factories to the limit. Honda is running at nearly 95% capacity, according to AutoForecast Solutions. BMW (93%), Mercedes-Benz (89%), and Toyota (88.5%) aren’t far behind.

These plants are humming to meet local and global demand and they don’t have much room to easily shift production of foreign-built models to the U.S. Meanwhile, General Motors has more than a quarter of its U.S. capacity unused. Stellantis (61.5%), Nissan (57%), and Volvo (46%) also have room to spare.

But filling those empty spaces isn’t simple. When Volvo moved some EX30 production from China to its Ghent, Belgium plant, it had to invest €200 million to overhaul the facility. That meant a new platform, nearly 600 new or refurbished robots, an expanded battery hall, a new door line and a new battery pack assembly line.

You can’t just dust off old robots and start building EVs. As AutoForecast’s Sam Fiorani told Automotive News:

“The rhetoric that moving assembly of vehicles into open spaces is easy and quick” is not accurate, said Sam Fiorani, vice president of global vehicle forecasting at AutoForecast Solutions. “There is some room, but a lot of it would entail large amounts of investment to change over lines. It’s a whole logistical nightmare that these plants aren’t set up for.”

That said, some Michigan plants could be ready to pivot. Stellantis’ Warren Truck plant—where the Jeep Wagoneer and Grand Wagoneer are built—is operating at just 17% capacity. Since those SUVs share a platform with the Ram 1500, the plant already has the tools and machinery to handle more production.

Ford’s Mustang plant in Flat Rock, Michigan is another possibility. It’s currently running just one shift and is reportedly a “prime candidate” to move production of the Mustang Mach-E from Mexico to the U.S. The Mach-E is one of the best-selling EVs in America, helped by its $36,495 starting price made possible by lower-cost Mexican production. Whether Ford could keep that price if it shifts production stateside is unknown.

And one last thing: don’t be fooled by all that idle capacity. Some automakers are deliberately keeping space open for future models. That’s why we’re not seeing a massive reshuffling of production yet. For now, automakers are in wait-and-watch mode, hoping to strike a deal with the Trump administration before their pre-tariff inventories run dry.

60%: Tesla Price Hikes In Canada Are Steep

The fallout from President Trump’s tariff war has started to affect the company run by his biggest financial backer during last year’s presidential elections. That would be Elon Musk and Tesla which, has raised prices of its electric cars in Canada by as much as $30,000 (Canadian) for some high-end models, according to local outlet Drive Tesla Canada.

Prices of the Tesla Model 3 are up from $68,990 to $79,990 due to Canada’s retaliatory tariffs on President Trump’s sweeping 25% tariffs on goods imported from Canada and Mexico. The Model Y is now $15,000 more expensive across the northern border, with its price jumping from $69,990 to $84,990. 

The Model S and Model X, meanwhile, are $19,000 more expensive, with the former now starting at $133,990 and the latter $154,990. Prices of the Tesla Cybertruck all-wheel drive have increased by $25,000 to $139,900 whereas the Cyberbeast has taken a steep $30,000 hike. It now costs a whopping $167,900 in Canada.

None of this is good news for a company with tanking sales and plummeting profits. Tesla's brand image has taken a hammering in recent weeks, and there's no indication it will improve anytime soon.

90%: Japanese Automakers Turn To ‘Chinese Brains’

Toyota bZ7 (China)

If you can’t beat them, why not join them? Japanese automakers are facing existential crises in China. Now they’re teaming up with local players to stay relevant. 

Despite Toyota sedans being so popular in the U.S., the automaker has decided to launch its first electric sedan, the bZ7, in China. That model will use tech giant Huawei’s HarmonyOS for its in-vehicle software and infotainment. Chinese start-up Momenta will supply the advanced driver assistance system (ADAS) for the Toyota EV. Nissan has also partnered with Momenta in China for the same. And Honda on the other hand has joined hands with DeepSeek for voice commands in its vehicles in China. Honda is also working with CATL for its battery tech, Nikkei Asia reported.

The tech advancements in China are beyond anyone’s wildest imagination. Not only have Chinese automakers raced past the U.S. and the rest of the world, but are also fiercely competing amongst themselves to stay ahead.

100%: Will You Pay More For A U.S.-Made Car?

A latest Financial Times survey asked Americans if they wanted more factory jobs here in the U.S. Most of them agreed, as long as they didn’t have to work in them. And that’s across party lines. People who voted for either party last year said they personally wouldn't be better off working in manufacturing.

So here’s some food for thought: Would you be willing to pay more for a car if was built in the U.S., or is price still the biggest factor for you? Leave your thoughts in the comments.

Have a tip? Contact the author: Suvrat.kothari@insideevs.com

Related Stories

Alpine is working hard to have the new A390 ready for a reveal on May 27. This high-riding sedan-shaped crossover will take the French brand in a new direction, and by that, we mean away from sports cars. That might make people sad, but at least the automaker is heading into the future sideways—in the best possible way.

That's the gist from a new set of teaser photos showing an A390 prototype in action. Alpine says the car is undergoing its final testing and development, which includes wet-track tomfoolery at Michelin's Ladoux facility in central France. Michelin collaborated with Alpine to develop two new versions of the Pilot Sport specifically for the A390, which likely explains why testing is taking place on Michelin's track. The smaller of the two is a 20-inch Pilot Sport EV. A 21-inch Pilot Sport 4S is also used.

Based on the photos, we'd say the tires are getting a healthy workout. The A390 has a tri-motor powertrain that doles out horsepower through five drive modes, one of which is a dedicated track mode. That enables all sorts of torque vectoring and modified stability settings, some of which apparently allow for some gratuitous opposite-lock driving. That's an assumption on our part, as Alpine isn't ready to tell us everything about its new car.

We do know some things, however. The latest teaser mentions the Alpine Drive Sound audio system, but it's not a banging stereo for listening to music. Instead, two distinct sounds will echo through the interior while the A390 is in operation, designed to "enhance the driver's experience," according to Alpine.

These sounds don't mimic a combustion engine, but one is derived from the A110's turbocharged four-cylinder mill. This is called the "sportier" version, while a second sound is designed for daily driving duties. It has less bass, but if you prefer your electric cars to be silent, Alpine says both can be turned down or shut off completely. A similar system is offered in the A290, an electric hot hatchback for Europe.

The A390 is not an SUV or a crossover, according to Alpine. It was christened a "sport fastback" when the A390_β concept car was shown back in October 2024. The production car will look very much like the concept, and under the skin, it shares a platform with the Nissan Ariya. The tri-motor layout is all Alpine, however, with a single unit in front and two at the back. Details like power and range will no doubt be kept secret until the reveal at the end of May.

More From Alpine

Source: Alpine

Mercedes-AMG is working on a bespoke electric fastback that will take the fight to the Porsche Taycan, which will be revealed in June. With the announcement, AMG also shared an image of the car’s side profile, which, even if mostly obscured, still looks great. And it should have performance to match its aggressive design.

The teaser shot gives us a good look at the upcoming four-door’s hood area, greenhouse and rear flanks, and it ticks all the boxes of what makes a great modern sports sedan. The nose looks very low and pointy, like a Porsche 911 from the side.

The greenhouse tapers aggressively toward the vehicle's rear, leading to a short decklid, which will likely have a small spoiler that pops up at speed, just like the current gas-burning four-door AMG GT. Unlike the Porsche Taycan sedan, this car’s main European rival, the AMG, will have a liftback trunk opening, which is more practical and better suited to the fastback-style aesthetic.

Even if this new EV ticks all the right low-slung sporty four-door design boxes, it also needs to perform, and we’re pretty sure it will have around 1,000 horsepower in its most powerful guise. It needs that power level to compete with the quickest cars in the segment, and AMG has just the right motors for the job.

They are supplied by Mercedes-owned British subsidiary Yasa and are called axial-flux motors that offer “the greatest efficiencies and highest power and torque density in their class, for the smallest size and weight.” Each motor makes 480 horsepower and 590 pound-feet of torque, so if Mercedes is making a quad-motor performance EV (it wouldn’t be the first time or even the second), it could have almost 2,000 hp and over 2,300 lb-ft of torque.

Even a dual-motor car with these drive units would be highly potent and come close to matching the most powerful version of the Porsche Taycan. However, BMW is working on quad-motor EVs, and several fast EVs are coming out of China with two or three motors and over 1,000 hp (even over 1,500 hp), so AMG may want to make a splash and launch something that's much more powerful than all direct competitors.

More On This

It’s worth noting that this bespoke AMG EV is coming at a time when Mercedes is changing course on its strategy to have a parallel lineup of electric and combustion models. It will phase out its current crop of EQ-badged bespoke EVs (and the EQ naming scheme) and instead launch electric versions of the regular models in its lineup.

We’re pretty sure the car that AMG is teasing here will be a pure EV with no combustion option, but the brand previously said it is the “first dedicated electric vehicle architecture developed by Mercedes-AMG.” That architecture is called AMG.EA (short for AMG electric architecture) and is unique to AMG. It will also underpin a taller electric AMG SUV, which is expected to be revealed after the fastback, offering much of the same but in a taller package.

Tesla has been in the news cycle a lot lately, and not for the best reasons. Yes, sales are down. Profits are way down. And Elon Musk is stirring the political pot faster than a Model S Plaid gets to 60 mph. But let's forget all that for a moment and remember one thing Teslas are really good at: Going fast.

To help, we turn to Wheels Plus on YouTube. This short video captures a trio of Model 3s and a single Model Y enjoying some speed runs on the drag strip at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Among the challengers are two C8 Corvettes, a Mustang Shelby GT500 and a hilariously large Ford pickup truck. We don't have any details regarding the gas burners, nor do we know specific trim levels on the Teslas. We can tell you everything here is pretty darned quick. Two of the Tesla dip into the 11-second range.

The action begins with a Model 3 facing a black C8 Chevrolet Corvette, and this one doesn't end well for Team Tesla. Despite a healthy starting line advantage, the 'Vette charges past to take the win. Still, the Tesla goes 13.84—that's not slow by any definition.

Vengeance comes with race number two. Another C8 Stingray lines up, only this time the competition in a Model Y. It's a pretty close race, too, with the drivers separated by just a tenth of a second. However, when you're turning a low-12-second quarter-mile, a tenth may as well be a mile. Chalk a win for the Model Y.

The third race sees a big ol' Ford at the starting line, off-road tires and all. The driver still does a burnout, and to be honest, it sounds pretty good. Clearly there's a V-8 under the hood, and we reckon it has quite a few modifications because it goes 13.62 in the quarter, lifted suspension and all. But its competitor, another Model 3, goes much, much faster.

That brings us to the final race, and it's the quickest run of the video. We have another Model 3, this time facing down a Mustang Shelby GT500 on drag tires. Both cars turn an 11-second quarter-mile, but only one wins.

We'll leave that mystery for the video to solve.

More Racing Fun:

Slate dropped a bombshell this week when it revealed both itself and its first model: a utilitarian electric pickup truck expected to cost under $20,000 after factoring in the federal tax credit for plug-in cars. 

Cheap electric vehicles have been elusive for years, in part because EV batteries have historically been so expensive. So this truck could be a very big deal once production starts in late 2026—if Slate can avoid the pitfalls that tanked other EV startups. 

Given the whole battery-cost hurdle, you might expect the startup’s pickup to use lithium-iron-phosphate (LFP) cells, a chemistry that’s gaining traction worldwide thanks to its lower cost. You’d be wrong. Slate is going with pricier and more typical nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC) batteries. 

Slate Auto EV Truck

Chris Barman, Slate’s CEO, told InsideEVs it came down to where the supply chains for these two chemistries are located. She explained it would’ve been challenging to comply with the EV tax credit’s battery-sourcing requirements while using LFP. 

“We've gone with more of what's in the mainstream right now and that many others in the industry are using. So we're using more of what's been scaled within the U.S.,” she said. “For LFP, most of those materials would come out of China or elsewhere.”

The $7,500 federal rebate for EV buyers is a key driver of Slate’s price proposition, especially given how bare-bones its truck is before options. (It sports crank windows, no radio and a 150-mile range.) But the incentive isn’t available for buyers of just any vehicle. EVs need to be produced in North America. Slate’s got that covered with a factory opening up somewhere in the Midwest. 

Slate Auto EV Truck

And the battery pack that powers a qualifying vehicle can’t use components or critical minerals that come from a “foreign entity of concern,” which is government-speak for adversaries like China. The rules, passed during the Biden administration, aim to spur more domestic EV and battery manufacturing, while also making the car industry less reliant on China. That country has a stranglehold on global battery production. By some estimates, it’s responsible for 98% of the world’s supply of active materials for LFP batteries. 

On top of that, battery cells need to meet requirements for both their components and raw materials that get stricter each year throughout this decade. By 2029, 100% of a qualifying vehicle’s battery components must be made in North America. By 2027, 80% of an EV battery’s critical minerals must be recycled in North America, come from the U.S. or come from a country the U.S. has a free-trade agreement with. 

Slate Auto EV Truck

It’s a lot to deal with. But Slate has the advantage of being able to spin up its supply chains with these rules already in place. As the requirements have tightened up, manufacturers with EVs already on the road have had to scramble to remain compliant, with some models losing tax-credit eligibility altogether. 

Of course, there’s also no guarantee the EV tax credit will remain on the books much longer. President Trump and his allies in Congress have proposed killing the subsidy.

At the end of the day, Slate went with U.S.-made NMC cells from the South Korean battery manufacturer SK On. The automaker inked an initial deal to purchase 20 gigawatt-hours of battery cells through 2031. That adds up to around 380,000 of its 52.7-kilowatt-hour packs. (Slate will also offer a larger 84.3-kWh pack with extra range.)

Slate Auto EV Truck

Another reason Slate went with NMC was its superior energy density. LFP packs are durable, known for their fast-charging abilities and use cheaper raw materials. But an NMC pack that takes up the same amount of space will generally deliver more range. 

Eric Keipper, Slate’s head of engineering, said the automaker could’ve managed the 150-mile range of its base vehicle with LFP cells. But energy density would’ve been a problem for the longer-range, 240-mile version. That makes sense, given that the Slate truck is pretty tiny and there’s only so much space in the floor for battery cells. 

“We wouldn't have necessarily been able to get the energy density with LFP. So that was one of the factors,” he told InsideEVs, when asked about the decision between the two chemistries. “But really it’s the availability in the United States.”

Got a tip about the EV world? Contact the author: Tim.Levin@InsideEVs.com

More On Slate's Truck

Here's something I figured out pretty quickly at the Shanghai Auto Show this past week: You can tell a lot from which cars and which brands the crowds are interested in.

This event is, after all, the biggest annual automotive trade show (along with its biennial counterpart in Beijing) in the world's largest new car market and one utterly dominated by first-rate electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids. It's as competitive a market as they get. Every company that comes here has to bring their A-game. Yet even when they do, Chinese buyers, journalists, engineers, executives and influencers can only be bothered to care about the best of the best. 

That cool new Buick we wish we had in the U.S.? That stand was a ghost town. So was Lincoln's. Next to Lincoln, however, people were literally getting in lines to sit inside the Li Auto Mega, an electric van that's already been on sale for a year. This isn't even a national pride thing; plenty of Chinese brands struggled to capture attention as well. In a car market this big, there are always bound to be winners and losers. 

That's why I was profoundly surprised, on the two days I was there, to see so much interest in Nissan's offerings. Yes, Nissan. The one that seems to only make headlines for being on the verge of death these days.

But the Chinese folks at the show, plus any Western attendees such as myself, couldn't get enough of the cars Nissan had on display: several examples of the Nissan N7 all-electric sedan, and one bright yellow Nissan Frontier Pro PHEV, which made its debut at Shanghai. Both cars were pretty mobbed on the two days I went to the show.

My colleague Kevin Williams and I both wondered, why the hell can't these be sold in the United States? Because we're convinced they would capture the same level of attention over here.

Photos of the Nissan N7 and Nissan Frontier PHEV Pickup Truck from the 2025 Shanghai Auto Show.

Let's start with the Nissan N7. The world first saw it a few months ago and a full year before that as the Nissan Epoch Concept. It's finally going on sale in China soon, made through Nissan's joint venture with local partner Dongfeng. Spec-wise, it's nothing terribly exciting. You can have either a 58 kWh or a 73 kWh lithium iron phosphate battery (LFP) battery, a range of 316 miles (510 km) and 388 miles (625 km), respectively, and up to 268 horsepower. It's super aerodynamic at just 0.208 Cd, but it makes do with a 400-volt EV architecture.

The N7 does, however, offer a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor for the kinds of first-rate software features Chinese buyers demand, including DeepSeek AI integration. All in all, it's kind of a mid-tier EV for China's ultra-advanced market, but not everything needs to be a groundbreaking supercar. 

Photos of the Nissan N7 and Nissan Frontier PHEV Pickup Truck from the 2025 Shanghai Auto Show.

But the N7 has one big thing going for it: it looks fantastic. Perhaps a bit generic in a country where many new EVs boast sleek lines for aerodynamics and thin LED lights for efficiency, but in person, it's quite handsome. I think the crowds at Shanghai felt the same way; show-goers were lining up to get video, take photos and poke around inside. 

Photos of the Nissan N7 and Nissan Frontier PHEV Pickup Truck from the 2025 Shanghai Auto Show.

Arguably, that's where it shines the most. The interior looks like the kind of car we should've gotten if Nissan had kept up its arms race with Tesla instead of... well, doing whatever it is it did instead of that. You get a display in front of the driver, a larger tablet in the dashboard, soft touch materials throughout (including with creamy white and navy colors, a seemingly common combo in China) and enough buttons and switches to avoid complete and total minimalism. 

It's a nice EV. It looks like it would be a fine Tesla Model 3-fighter in America, albeit without that car's higher-performance specs. But as Kevin said, "Why isn't this being built in Smyrna, with U.S.-compliant batteries and software? People in America would drive this thing." I agree with him. 

Photos of the Nissan N7 and Nissan Frontier PHEV Pickup Truck from the 2025 Shanghai Auto Show.

But the real sense of missing out comes from that Frontier Pro PHEV. China isn't a very big pickup truck market. They're largely treated as commercial vehicles here and often restricted from going certain places, like elevated freeways. This new Frontier is one of several new truck models trying to give it a go, and since this is China, it's an electrified truck—Nissan's first. (It's incredible how a company that so pioneered electrified vehicles is just now getting around to adding battery power to its trucks, in the middle of the 2020s, but here we are.) 

Photos of the Nissan N7 and Nissan Frontier PHEV Pickup Truck from the 2025 Shanghai Auto Show.

The Frontier Pro PHEV gets a 1.5-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine mated to an unspecified battery, although we do know that it delivers up to 6 kilowatts of power. And it'll do an impressive 84 miles (135 km) on purely electric power, and while that's on China's generous testing cycle, it would probably shame many of our PHEVs. It's the product of another partnership, essentially a reskinned Dongfeng Z9. But Nissan leaned into its heritage here with a grille and overall design that apes the 1980s Nissan D21 hardbody pickup. 

Nissan Hardbody/Frontier Pro

I know that our current reality of tariffs and software bans and sanctions on battery materials make Chinese-imported vehicles like this impossible. But as with many other EVs and PHEVs I have driven here over the past week, it does feel like the American market is missing out by not getting these vehicles—or at least, these kinds of vehicles from Nissan. 

Ultimately, they make me wish history had gone a different way—that Nissan would've kept up its investments into cars like the Leaf or even the Altima Hybrid and figured out a way to stay in the lead on electrification. Perhaps we wouldn't have exactly these cars, but something like them instead. Meanwhile, back home, Nissan has nothing for U.S. buyers except the usual excuses and... the Kicks? The Ariya, I suppose? More expensive crossovers, more canceled EV plans, and more excuses. 

Supposedly, Nissan has some big turnaround plans in the works for the U.S. and its global markets. I know that revamped Dongfeng vehicles likely won't be part of those grand designs. But if good-looking, well-priced Nissan EVs and PHEVs can impress Chinese buyers, then imagine what could be accomplished if the automaker stuck with a real electrification strategy and actually got it done, for a change.

Contact the author: patrick.george@insideevs.com

More Nissan News

Ford’s top electric vehicle engineer said on Wednesday that the automaker is actively working on a “game-changing” battery chemistry for its future EVs. The breakthrough will reportedly enable low-cost and longer-range Ford EVs by the end of the decade.

Charles Poon, the director of electrified propulsion engineering at Ford said his team has developed a lithium manganese rich (LMR) cell chemistry at its Ion Park battery research and development center in Romulus, Michigan. Ford is now already producing a second generation of these cells on a pilot line in Michigan.

Poon said in a LinkedIn post that LMR has several advantages over nickel-based chemistries. That includes improved safety and stability and more energy density leading to a longer driving range compared to high-nickel batteries. He also added that Ford is expecting “unprecedented” cost reduction and the breakthrough was critical to achieving “true cost parity” with gas-powered vehicles.

Ford's lithium manganese rich (LMR) cells rolling out of a pilot production line in Michigan.

“Ford started by offering nickel-manganese-cobalt (NMC) batteries and later added lithium-iron-phosphate (LFP) batteries in 2023. LMR is the answer to 'what next?'" Poon said. “This isn't just a lab experiment. We're actively working to scale LMR cell chemistry and integrate them into our future vehicle lineup within this decade,” he added.

Lithium-rich manganese-based cathode materials were discovered 30 years ago, according to a study published in the academic journal Science Direct. Theoretically, they offer superior energy density and cost advantages due to the elimination of nickel and cobalt, which are both dirty to produce and expensive. LMR cells also offer high working voltage initially.

But that’s where the pros end. Despite the chemistry existing for three decades, it hasn’t been commercialized due to voltage attenuation, which means a substantial loss in voltage over time. LMR also suffers from severe capacity loss, which could lead to reduced driving range and thermal stability degradation, which means the cells may not be safe when the mercury climbs.

Since Ford is already producing these cells on a pilot line, it might have found solutions to these problems. But details of this project are scarce right now. Automakers and battery companies tend to be tight-lipped about their product plans, treating them as heavily guarded secrets. We may not learn a whole lot more about Ford’s plans for a while.

Ford currently uses an LFP battery on the base version of the Mustang Mach-E and NMC batteries on the rest of the line-up, including for the E-Transit and F-150 Lightning. Several new models are in the pipeline, including a compact SUV and truck under its “skunkworks” affordable EV project and the next generation of its electric truck which is codenamed T3.

The automaker is also working on extended-range electric vehicle (EREV) versions of its SUVs, crossovers and the Super Duty pickup. Novel chemistries aren't theoretically limited to a specific type of vehicle or powertrain, and can be used in hybrids, PHEVs, EREVs and BEVs, depending on what makes the most economical sense.

Contact the author: suvrat.kothari@Insideevs.com

Related Stories

A lot of manufacturers are putting their eggs in the fully electric, large, expensive pickup truck basket. Just the other week, Volkswagen dashed the hopes of every cheap EV hatchback enthusiast to pieces when it announced it wouldn’t be bringing the ID.1 or ID.2 to the US, and instead would focus on building yet another electric pickup for US consumption.

But the release of the new Nissan Frontier at the Shanghai Auto Show this week, and the interest around it, got me thinking about what automakers are doing wrong. 

I don’t know what sales charts they’re looking at or the crystal ball they've been consulting, but it's becoming clearer that big electric pickup trucks might not be the move, no matter how good they are. The Cybertruck is stuck on dealership lots with incentives to get it moving, while Ford has had spells of idling production of the F-150 Lightning at its Dearborn, Michigan plant. Don’t even ask about the Silverado EV’s not-so-good resale values.

Despite the lackluster sales performance of some of the larger EV pickups, research from AutoPacific shows that there’s still a sizable number of people who want some sort of electrification with a bed. It just won’t be in the form of a full-size truck. 

“When we’ve surveyed future mid-size pickup truck buyers, our AutoPacific research has found that 23% of them would be interested in a PHEV, a stark difference compared to just 14% demand for exclusively EV power. Jumping up a size, it is a similar scenario for full-size pickup truck buyers, as there’s more interest in plug-in hybrid powertrains than pure electrics,” wrote Robby DeGraff, the Manager of Product and Consumer Insights at the automotive analyst firm AutoPacific.

Furthermore, DeGraff explained that the desire for a PHEV truck jumps to nearly a third of buyers when Nissan as a brand is broken out of the statistics of truck buyers as a whole.

This is why it’s such a shame that Nissan is adamant that it has no plans to bring the PHEV pickup to North America. Even if the Chinese Frontier Pro PHEV’s 84-mile EV range would likely not go as far on the U.S. EPA cycle, it would still be enough to provide electric, engine-off driving for many pickup truck buyers. If Nissan is curious as to how a PHEV pickup could perform in North America, all it has to do is look to Mexico or Australia, where the BYD Shark is starting to make inroads. For once, perhaps a legacy automaker could beat a Chinese EV maker to the punch, at least when it comes to the U.S. 

In fact, the demand for a PHEV mid-sized pickup seems to go hand-in-hand with the announcement of the Slate pickup truck. True, its 150-mile range and single-motor design likely won’t be able to tow or haul very far, but there’s more to the story here. Price and real-world utility of the Slate truck, or a theoretical mid-sized PHEV truck, make them a lot more attractive than full-sizers for many people. Few can afford the nearly six-figure price tags of trucks like the Rivian R1T or Tesla Cybertruck.

Slate Auto EV Truck

If Slate and Nissan both find success with their respective not-so-large electrified trucks, then perhaps it’ll persuade more automakers to back away from the overly huge EV trucks and invest in smaller and cheaper designs. 

Contact the author: Kevin.Williams@InsideEVs.com

Related Articles

Slate is the newest automaker in the EV world, but it's not pushing a vaporware product. It spent the last two years quietly developing a small, barebones electric truck that can also become a five-seater SUV with a bolt-on conversion. The company revealed its efforts on Thursday with multiple functioning prototypes on hand, something we seldom see from an EV startup. And the big news? Prices should start under $20,000 once EV tax incentives are factored in.

Slate makes a compelling case, given the average cost of a new vehicle is more than double that starting price. So when the company announced reservations were open with a $50 refundable deposit, I stepped up. Shortly thereafter, Slate's website went live with a configurator full of options to customize your truck. So that's exactly what I did, which I now present here for your consideration.

I didn't go crazy on extras. For me, the magic here is a basic truck that doesn't cost as much as a small house. Slate offers dozens upon dozens of aesthetic tweaks, everything from different grilles and bumper designs to fender flares, stripes and accent colors on interior components. I chose to keep everything stock on the outside save for the color and wheels.

This is a partial wrap (called the Snow Dog) that adds silver sides with a wrap color on the upper half. I went with Blue Steel, but Slate offers 12 colors, or if none are to your liking, you can select a custom shade—presumably for an extra cost. It exudes a nice 1980's two-tone vibe ... which I suspect was Slate's goal with this option.

I nixed the steel wheels for 17-inch silver aluminum rims shod with all-terrain tires. That requires choosing the higher ride height, or you can go in the opposite direction with a lowered suspension. 20-inch wheels are also an option, but frankly, that seems ridiculous in this application. I could've added running boards, a roof rack, different taillight options, different bumpers, stripes, badges, a spare tire carrier and much more. But like I said, I want to keep this minimal.

That brings me to the interior. The big news here is a complete lack of virtually anything you'd expect in a modern car, from power windows to even a simple stereo. I have my Slate equipped with the larger tablet holder, essentially giving me a touchscreen large enough for my old(er) eyes to see for navigation and tunes.

Speaking of which, Slate offers a pair of built-in speakers for the dash, but I choose the Bluetooth speaker holder. I've never been impressed by modern stereo systems with a gazillion speakers—cars are not home theaters. So a simple speaker connected to Spotify is all I need.

I keep the crank windows, too. Honestly, I'd be happy to go with power windows provided it's not a silly-expensive option. Same goes for the dozens of aesthetic color choices for interior trim. You can make the Slate's interior bright and cheerful, and features like a center console (which I've added to my spec) offer a bit more practicality. You can even get a holder for sunglasses.

As Slate promised, there are enough choices to make your truck a one-of-one vehicle. That's before you look at the SUV bolt-on kits that add either a square or fastback roof and a back seat. Unfortunately, without any prices listed, I'm very nervous that Slate's super-tempting base price will skyrocket.

A sub-$20,000 pickup with crank windows, vinyl floors and no stereo sounds interesting. But if adding just a bit of personalization pushes that to $30,000—also with crank windows, vinyl floors, and no stereo—it becomes significantly less interesting.

And none of this includes a battery upgrade. The Slate comes with a 52.7-kWh battery good for an estimated 150 miles of range. An 84.3-kWh battery is optional, bumping range to an estimated 240 miles. Given my rural location, I'd like the bigger battery. But if it pushes the price too high, the whole deal is off.

Time will tell. Slate is planning a production launch in the fourth quarter of 2026. You can bet we'll be watching as more details are announced.

More On Slate:

The Cybertruck made a loud entrance when Tesla unveiled the wild-looking stainless steel cheese wedge in 2019. By the time it began deliveries, the Cybertruck had amassed an estimated two million preorders and had built a supposed multi-year backlog of deliveries. However, the look-at-me-mobile hasn't really had the impact that Tesla had hoped for since it officially began deliveries.

New data from Cox estimates that Tesla sold just 6,406 Cybertrucks in Q1. Now, sure, that's up from Q1 2024, however, it's a straight-up decline from Q3 and Q4 where Tesla sold more than twice the number of units each quarter. Now, the automaker is doing just about everything it can to increase sales, but the trucks still aren't selling.

Let's put things into perspective a bit. CEO Elon Musk originally estimated that Tesla would crank out a quarter-million Cybertrucks annually. It has since tapered its expectations and reduced that number to around 120,000 units. Q1 sales show that Tesla's Cybertrucks are selling at a rate of around 21% of the production line's capacity—that's not a great sign. Wasted production time is lost money for the brand.

Tesla once boasted about the Cybertruck being the best-selling electric pickup in the U.S., but now its competitors are catching up. The Ford sold 7,187 F-150 Lightnings (which is actually a decrease year-over-year) while the Chevy Silverado EV and GMC Sierra EV sold a combined 3,632 vehicles. Rivian managed to sell 1,727 R1Ts while GM also moved 3,479 Hummer EVs.

Sales of Tesla's lower-volume luxury vehicles also took a beating in Q1. Data from Cox shows that the Model S and Model X, which don't exactly move mountains to begin with, sold just 5,213 units combined. Just as a comparison, the BMW i4 sold an estimated 7,125 units during the quarter.

The problem goes beyond Tesla's more premium segment. The company's image has become almost toxic, especially with its active CEO becoming an extremely polarizing political figurehead. The automaker admitted in its quarterly earnings report that it expects "changing political sentiment" could influence demand of its vehicles and CFO Vaibhav Taneja even said that vandalism and open hostility towards Tesla, something driven by political discourse, has "had an impact in certain markets."

Now, look, I'm not saying that the Cybertruck is going to end up at the Petersen in an exhibit next to the VW Phaeton and Chrysler TC by Maserati. But the way things are going, it doesn't look promising.

Tesla is doing just about everything it can to prop up Cybertruck sales. From cash on the hood to marketing it as a real truck to actual truck buyers, the brand knows that it needs to do something to increase the CT's take-rate.

To be fair, Musk admitted early on that the truck could "flop." In the same breath, he also said that he didn't care because he loves it so much. Now that Musk's words are coming home to roost, the brand is facing some trouble. If it were just Cybertruck sales falling flat, things would be a different story. But with net income dropping 71% year-over-year for Q1, a product flop might be a more serious problem for the brand than it anticipated back in 2021.

More Cybertruck News

This decade will likely go down in history as the one where electric vehicles truly took off. Now, as automakers sow the seeds for self-driving cars, the next decade could be the era of the robotaxi. And no, they probably won’t be limited to fleets and ride-hailing services. Personal self-driving cars are very much on the table. Tesla says they’re coming. Alphabet, Waymo’s parent company, is also suggesting as much.

Welcome to the Friday edition of Critical Materials, your daily round-up of news and events shaping the world of electric cars and technology. Also on the radar today: Tesla CEO Elon Musk may have scored a win as the Trump administration announced looser regulations for autonomous vehicles. And Volkswagen jumps on the extended-range electric vehicle (EREV) bandwagon after showcasing the ID. Era at Auto Shanghai. It plans to develop its own EREV powertrain for Europe.

30%: Waymo AVs As Personal Vehicles?

Waymo has come a long way. It started as a small autonomous vehicle (AV) project under Google in 2009. In 2017, it first started testing a fleet of Chrysler Pacifica minivans in Phoenix, Arizona, before launching a commercial service for the public the following year.

It then expanded to San Francisco in 2021 with the Jaguar I-Pace electric crossover retrofitted with radars, LiDAR and cameras. These cars are now in L.A. and Austin, with Atlanta and Washington D.C. coming soon. There were regulatory hurdles, safety investigations and also accidents, but Alphabet continued investing in Waymo to maintain its lead. And the fleet is growing fast—Waymo is already operating 700 robotaxis in the U.S., of which 300 are in San Francisco alone.

Now Alphabet could help drive its sales further, especially if it's outfitted with cutting-edge self-driving hardware and software. Sundar Pichai, the CEO of Alphabet, said in Thursday’s earnings call that the tech giant is considering offering Waymos as personal vehicles.

Here’s more from Reuters:

Pichai, on a post-earnings conference call, did not provide a timeline or any detail on how it plans to sell Waymo vehicles, beyond saying "there is future optionality for personal ownership."

Waymo would likely offer personal ownership of its robotaxis through a partnership model, said David Heger, an analyst at Edward Jones. "Google doesn't build its own automobiles and I certainly don't think they would try to get into that business," he said.

Pichai's comments were in response to an analyst's question about Waymo's future. "This is probably the first question I've got on an earnings call on Waymo," Pichai joked. "It's a sign of its progress."

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has promised for years that personal Teslas will become autonomous in the near future. Owners could offer them as robotaxis—like a combination of AirBnb and Uber. When they don’t need their vehicles, they could earn money from this unique business model with Tesla getting a cut from the earnings.

That's nowhere close to happening—Tesla’s rollout of the robotaxi ride-hailing service is yet to begin. For years, Musk has promised things that aren’t even remotely close to existence, amassing support with just promises, government interest and investor enthusiasm. Those promises oftentimes are fulfilled, albeit with years-long delays.

Will Waymo's robotaxi-for-everyone ambitions come to fruition? The company's scope and scale of robotaxis as personal vehicles is unclear as of now. Musk even joked on Tesla’s earnings call on Tuesday, saying Waymo AVs with their expensive autonomous driving hardware are “waymo expensive” than Tesla’s relatively lower-cost approach that ditches radar and lidar for cameras and artificial intelligence. For now, we'll have to wait and see.

60%: NHTSA Loosens AV Regulations

Regardless of the approach AV companies undertake, the speed of deployment depends on regulatory approvals and certification from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). With the agency firmly under the grip of the Trump administration, Musk may have a reason to rejoice.

NHTSA’s revised rules will allow some AVs to operate on U.S. roads that don’t comply with federal safety standards—like having a rearview mirror for example, according to Reuters. Reporting for less severe crashes will now be monthly and some AVs will be exempt from safety requirements.

Here’s more from the Reuters report:

U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the new framework to boost autonomous vehicles would help U.S. automakers compete with Chinese rivals.

"This administration understands that we’re in a race with China to out-innovate, and the stakes couldn’t be higher," Duffy said. "Our new framework will slash red tape."

Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety said it was disappointed that the U.S. Department of Transportation "chose to dilute, instead of enhance, the reporting requirements."

The Alliance for Automotive Innovation, a trade group representing nearly all major automakers, praised the USDOT. 

The industry has "been hamstrung by government inaction ... This announcement shows the administration is also proceeding with a sense of urgency, so we don't cede AV leadership to China and other countries," it said.

EV and AV-related programs draw mixed reactions in the U.S. Support depends on who you ask and what their stakes are in the process. That said, it’s true that the U.S. risks losing the AV race to China due to regulatory red tape.

But the sentiment regarding AVs and advanced driver assistance systems was greatly diluted at this week’s Shanghai Auto Show. A Xiaomi SU7 driving with its ADAS activated was involved in a fatal crash, killing three young female passengers in China in late March.

Now it will be worth keeping an eye on how AV companies balance public safety and tech advancements in the future.

90%: Volkswagen Jumps On The EREV Bandwagon

Volkswagen smoked Tesla to become Europe’s best-selling EV maker in the first quarter of this year. While the comeback is good news for the brand whose profits are tanking and EV sales struggling to take off, VW’s real competition is in China, where local players have eaten into its market share.

EREVs are already a growing segment in China and the automaker is now eyeing that segment. It showcased the ID. ERA concept at Auto Shanghai, an extended range EV VW developed with its group partner SAIC. A production version of that is expected to be VW’s first EREV model in China.

VW claims an EV-only range of 186 miles on the ID. ERA, plus an additional 435 miles with the gas generator. EREVs use combustion engines as generators to charge the high-voltage battery. But the engine is not connected to the wheels, only the electric motors are.

So in theory, EREVs offer the best of both worlds—gas and electric.

100%: Would You Buy A Personal Robotaxi?

The Waymo vehicles are expensive, with their cost potentially in six figures. But it’s also true that LiDAR costs are coming down. At some point in the future they could be democratized.

If these cars become cheaper, pass safety tests and are given regulatory approvals, would you consider buying one? What do you think are the pros and cons of having AVs as personal vehicles? Leave your thoughts in the comments.

Have a tip? Contact the author: suvrat.kothari@insideevs.com

Related Stories

I check out a lot of new electric cars here at InsideEVs. And sometimes I think to myself, "Yeah, I could really get used to this!" 

Then I look at my bank account. 

Without going into details, let's just say I'm not exactly prepared to purchase a $95,000 Lucid Gravity, no matter how outrageously impressive I think that vehicle is. I think that's exactly why Slate, America's latest electric vehicle startup, is so compelling to so many people. 

The company broke cover on Thursday night, announcing plans to bring a refreshingly simple and cheap EV pickup truck to market in late 2026. It comes with crank windows, two seats, no touchscreen and a targeted price of under $20,000 after federal rebates. That's about one-third the going rate for a new electric car in this country. 

Plus, Slate envisions the pickup as a blank canvas for upgrades, including a kit that transforms it into a five-seat SUV. Yep, you read that right. 

I checked out the Slate truck in person (see below), and I have thoughts! Thoughts on whether this is a good deal or not, thoughts on this wild customization process and thoughts on whether a low-tech EV works in 2025. My colleague Suvrat and I get into all that and more on this week's episode of The Plugged-In Podcast. 

We also talk about CATL's huge battery news and Tesla's awful first quarter. Can Tesla bounce back with the help of new affordable models? And what exactly will those models be like, anyway? 

Check out the show wherever you get your podcasts: We're on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeartRadio and more. If you haven't yet, please subscribe to the show and leave us a review. 

And we're looking to answer more listener questions on the show! Drop your burning questions about EVs, EV buying and the future of transportation below, or email us at podcast@insideevs.com.

Catch Up On The InsideEVs Podcast

When Volvo debuted the EX30 in 2023, it quickly became a fan favorite with its classic Scandinavian design, solid specs and a palatable $35,000 starting price. In a market where EVs have long been a luxury, the EX30 felt like a breath of fresh (Nordic) air.

But geopolitics got in the way and it never hit that starting price. U.S. tariffs on Chinese-made vehicles—first under Biden, now even steeper under Trump—put the brakes on Volvo’s plans. The company had always intended to build the EX30 in Europe too, but trade tensions forced it to fast-track the move.

Volvo EX30 Belgium Production

Now production of the EX30 is finally underway at Volvo’s Ghent plant in Belgium. The automaker poured €200 million ($227 million as of current exchange rates) into the facility, adding a new platform, extending the battery hall, installing 600 new or upgraded robots and setting up fresh production lines for doors and battery packs.

It’s a textbook example of how expensive, slow, and complicated it is to localize auto manufacturing. The U.S. industry is just starting to explore similar reshoring moves—but matching this level of transformation could take years and cost billions. And when inventories of cheaper imports dry up, prices could climb.

As Reuters reported, the EX30 was among a handful of Chinese-made vehicles sold in the U.S. Volvo is eligible for tariff refunds under a law that allowed firms that have U.S. operations, such as the automaker’s South Carolina plant that also exports vehicles.

That said, the EX30 quickly became one of Europe’s best-selling cars. In fact, it was the third best-selling car in Europe in 2024, with around 78,000 sales, ranking right behind the Tesla Model Y and Model 3.

The impact of European production on its prices is unclear for now. In the U.S., the EX30 starts at $44,900. With a 69 kilowatt-hour battery, it has an EPA range of 253 miles. Only the dual motor all-wheel-drive version is available stateside for now, and that cranks out 422 horsepower and 400 pound-feet of torque.

Have a tip? Contact the author: Suvrat.kothari@insideevs.com

Related Stories

As most car companies follow the Tesla playbook by doubling down on giant touchscreens and flashy software, Slate is going in the complete opposite direction. The startup debuted its first vehicle on Thursday, and it has virtually no tech whatsoever. 

If Tesla makes something resembling the iPhone of cars, then Slate’s two-door pickup truck is more like a Nokia flip phone. 

It sports an index-card-sized display that shows basic info like your speed, and that’s about it. There’s no infotainment system or speakers, which also means no radio. The truck even lacks an internet connection, something that's common in modern cars for things like remote access, map updates and media streaming. This all tracks with Slate’s goal of making a “back-to-basics” vehicle that costs less than $20,000 after federal EV incentives. That meant cutting nearly all the fat, save for stuff that doesn’t help the truck go or make it safer. 

Even so, as I learned from Slate reps at a preview event last week, the company devised a clever way of bringing some tech into its vehicle—and even enabling over-the-air software updates (OTAs). It’s probably in your pocket right now. 

“We didn’t want to force connectivity on everyone, and raise the price because of connectivity for everyone, when you don't actually need it,” Christophe Charpentier, Slate’s head of mobile experience, told InsideEVs. “We can actually run the updates through the phone. We can actually provide you the location of chargers through the phone. And so, technically speaking, we actually don't need connectivity.” 

The vehicle comes with a phone mount that connects a driver’s device to the truck. And, boom, that provides some basic infotainment functions plus the connection needed for software updates. Slate is developing an app to handle all of that. 

Pioneered by Tesla, OTA update capability allows automakers to freshen up their cars’ features over time and fix bugs that used to require a dealership visit. Here’s how that works in the Slate truck, per Charpentier.

Slate will identify a bug fix or improvement and post the relevant update to its cloud. Owners will get a notification that an update is available, and they’ll download it to their phones at their leisure. After that, they’ll plug their device into the truck to transmit the file. It may take something like 45 minutes for the software to fully install, but the phone only needs to stay plugged in for about the first minute. 

These OTAs won’t be as exciting as the fart sounds, video games and driver-assistance features you can download to a Tesla. Charpentier said they’ll be focused on bug fixes and minor improvements, rather than upgrades that meaningfully change the functionality of the vehicle. 

Slate’s app will also house some of the features you’d typically find in an infotainment system. I saw an early mock-up of it. 

The app is where owners will be able to search for charging stations, for example. Once they find one, the app will direct them to their preferred navigation app, whether that’s Google Maps, Apple Maps or Waze. Charpentier explained that there aren’t plans for a route-planning function, given that the Slate truck is designed as more of an around-town vehicle. There’s also a big button that drivers can tap to get to their favorite music app. 

“We really are focusing on the things that we believe provide unique added value, but we want customers to bring their own digital life into the cabin,” he said. It’s a different approach from that of, say, General Motors, Rivian and Tesla. Those automakers don’t offer Apple CarPlay or Android Auto for their EVs and instead aim to lure customers into their own software ecosystems. 

“Cool,” you’re thinking, “but how am I going to listen to Spotify without a stereo?” Slate promises a vast marketplace of accessories that owners can buy to trick out their very basic trucks, like Bluetooth speakers. 

The company is also considering a connectivity accessory, Charpentier said, but that would be mainly targeted toward commercial customers who want to track their fleets or install updates remotely. 

Got a tip about the EV world? Contact the author: Tim.Levin@InsideEVs.com

More EV News!

Shortly after I showed up at a Los Angeles studio space to take a sneak peek of Slate’s debut vehicle last week, the startup’s reps pulled a black sheet off of a charming, two-seat pickup truck. I thought it was refreshingly small and liked its clean, boxy look. And the claimed price tag of under $20,000 after federal incentives is hard to argue with, especially for an electric vehicle. 

But the most compelling part about Slate’s first model is that by the time I left the event, it had transformed into something entirely different: a five-passenger SUV. How? Let me explain. 

This American EV company broke cover on Thursday with a focus on two things that it argues are missing from the car market: affordability and customizability. Its truck will arrive in late 2026 in just about as bare-bones a form as you can imagine, sporting crank windows, no radio and steel wheels. That helps with the former. To achieve the latter, Slate says it will offer a dazzling array of interesting upgrades for owners to pick and choose from.

That laundry list of accessories includes kits that turn one’s pickup into an SUV. Pretty wild stuff. 

How Does Slate’s SUV Kit Impact Range?

Before I get into how the kit works and how it looks, allow me to flag one unexpected benefit of installing one. Eric Keipper, Slate’s head of engineering, told InsideEVs you’ll actually get a bit of extra range. And you may want every mile you can get, since the Slate’s standard battery pack delivers a manufacturer-projected range of only 150 miles. The optional bigger battery is rated for 240 miles. 

“The aerodynamics effect that you get from the SUV actually outweighs, so to speak, the weight that you add,” he said. 

In other words, the SUV’s seats, structure and roof make it heavier, increasing energy consumption. But its streamlined shape also makes it slice through the air more efficiently. At the end of the day, you can expect a “small percentage” more driving range in the SUV, Keipper said.

How Slate’s SUV Kit Works

Back to the details of Slate’s SUV kit. There are actually two of them. One is more boxy and bears a resemblance to a miniature Land Rover Defender (especially if you also slap on a spare tire holder). The other follows more of a slanted, fastback silhouette. With either kit, you can skip installing the roof entirely to wind up with an open-top SUV. 

Slate says owners can DIY install the kit in just a few hours. The company is planning a content library called Slate University that will walk owners through accessory installs step-by-step. Alternatively, buyers can spring for a professional installation through a “service partner.” 

The kit arrives flat-packed and includes a roll cage that has the airbags built right in. The extra seats bolt into a structure below the bed. A roof encloses everything. The partition between the cab and the bed gets taken out. And the truck’s rear glass becomes the SUV’s back window. I watched a team of Slate employees do this in around an hour. 

Experiencing Slate’s SUV

What I saw was a design prototype, so there were some fitment issues here and there. But as far as I could tell, the SUV kit integrates into the design pretty seamlessly. It doesn’t look like a truck with a camper shell dropped on top.

What’s it like inside? I have a few thoughts. 

You have to scramble into the back row because, of course, even the SUV has just two doors. I didn’t find much legroom back there. And the low seats left me sitting in more of a squat than I’d like. But then again, I’m 6 feet 1 inch tall, and this is quite a compact vehicle overall. It should be just fine for kids, which is how it’ll probably be used by most people anyway. 

I did have plenty of headroom though, thanks to the SUV’s boxy shape. So maybe Slate still has time to raise the seats a couple of inches before it locks in this design. 

The cargo area gains a roof but sacrifices some utility in a way that I didn’t expect. The SUV kit’s roll cage bolts down to either side of the truck’s bed, right next to the wheel wells. So you lose a good bit of width back there. And all that hardware turns the cargo area into a somewhat awkward shape. 

More On Slate

You’re probably screaming at your phone right now: “But how much does it cost?!” I’m right there with you, buddy. Slate isn’t talking about the price of any of its accessories yet. But that number will determine whether Slate’s magically transforming SUV is worth buying—or just a neat party trick.

Got a tip about the EV world? Contact the author: Tim.Levin@InsideEVs.com