Tesla and BYD steal the headlines as they race for global leadership in battery electric vehicles. But on the near horizon there is another technology that delivers zero emissions: hydrogen fuel cells. General Motors has been developing fuel cell solutions for more than 20 years. They are doing important pilot testing of fuel cell applications for Class 8 trucks, with the US military on battlefield applications and in mobile charging units. My guest this week, Charlie Freese, is an expert on all...
Oct 05, 2023•35 min
We begin Part II of this conversation with David Barboza in the days leading up to publication of arguably the most explosive and dangerous story out of China in 50 years. For the past 18 months, Barboza has been systematically collecting records and data and information about a massive amount of wealth accrued by the family of China's Prime Minister Wen Jiabao. Nothing is easy, clear or straightforward. There are layers of ownership by companies and people some of whom are only remotely related...
Sep 28, 2023•45 min
David Barboza won a Pulitzer prize for a blockbuster story he wrote while reporting in China for the New York Times. The story took years to research and write. Here is how things got started: Barboza had challenged himself with a daring and impossible goal. Would it be feasible, he wondered, to gather evidence that powerful leaders in China's Communist Party were amassing great wealth? He figured that if he were able to prove that a high-ranking family had assets of around $5 million dollars, i...
Sep 21, 2023•48 min
For most of his career, Tony Posawatz was a highly successful engineer working in GM's lucrative truck division. That meant big rigs powered by gasoline and diesel engines. Then one day in 2006 GM's top leadership appointed him to lead a breakthrough initiative. "Build us an electric car that will make people forget all about the Toyota Prius," they said. GM had taken a shot at an all-electric vehicle in the 1990s called the EV1. Tony and his team of top notch GM engineers knew that the way to b...
Sep 07, 2023•37 min
Here is the powerful China formula for commercial dominance that everyone needs to know. Build up massive capacity. Achieve scale. Reduce costs. And then export like a bat out of hell all over the world. This is exactly how China overwhelmed the solar panel industry. Will cars be next? You bet. In fact, it is already happening. China today has the capacity to build 40 million cars and trucks a year. Domestic demand is about half of that. So, this year, China will export 5 million vehicles to mor...
Aug 31, 2023•30 min
Who supplies the most cars to the Mexican market? If you guessed China, you are not wrong. China is flooding the market with low cost gasoline-powered and electric vehicles. Leading brands include SAIC-MG, Great Wall and Chery. But there's more. One of every two vehicles GM sells in Mexico is built in China. Meanwhile, Chinese suppliers are pouring into supporting Tesla's Giga 6 factory in Monterrey. What do Mexico's leaders make of this mass Chinese arrival? Will the Chinese automakers use Mexi...
Aug 24, 2023•33 min
Never before in the history of humanity have we had so many choices when it comes to what we drive. Think about it: We have cars, pickup trucks, SUVs, crossovers. station wagons. On size we run the spectrum from the tiny Mini Cooper beastly Hummer. And now these vehicles might be powered by gasoline engines, hybrids, batteries or hydrogen. Some of them even drive themselves, well almost. The average consumer has hundreds of options to choose from. So, how on earth do you land on exactly the righ...
Aug 17, 2023•42 min
China is now the world's No. 1 exporter of cars and trucks, blowing past Japan. In 2023, Chinese automakers will ship more than 4 million vehicles to over 100 markets markets worldwide. Leading destinations include Russia, Saudi Arabia, Chile, Sweden, Malaysia and Mexico. How good are these Chinese cars? And what kinds of challenges are they bound to encounter as they invade global markets. To get answers today our guest is Carlos Roma. Mr Roma is one of those rare western executives who can say...
Aug 10, 2023•49 min
Ready or not, we are in the midst of a global battery arms race. China enjoys a commanding lead. America and Europe are racing to catch up. This week we are joined by Simon Moores, CEO, Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. No one on the planet knows more about the lithium ion battery industry and gigafactories than Simon. He's been laser focused on it for more than 10 years. Today I will ask Simon some tough questions, including: Can America and Europe close the gap? How soon? Or does China have an i...
Jul 27, 2023•38 min
How much do you know about Taiwan? Until recently, most people in the world, if they were being honest, would say practically nothing. But not today. Today, Taiwan finds itself in a highly precarious situation. The People's Republic of China has clear its intentions to integrate Taiwan, to take control of the island and its 22 million residents. Not so fast, say the people of Taiwan. And the are not alone. The United States - most economies around the world, are heavily reliant on Taiwan for sup...
Jun 29, 2023•34 min
BYD is an electric vehicle powerhouse. Already dominant globally in buses and trucks, BYD is now chasing Tesla for world leadership in battery-powered electric vehicles. The Shenzhen-based company will produce more than 3 million electric vehicles in 2023. Many of those cars and SUVs will find their way to global markets including Thailand, Mexico, Germany, the UK, Australia and Japan. For the casual observer, BYD might appear to be an overnight sensation. But this is not that case. BYD is a 30-...
Jun 22, 2023•35 min
It is no secret that technology is taking over our cars. But what is stunning is the speed and magnitude of the onslaught. Some of it looks amazing. Other stuff feels downright invasive. Hello biometrics and autonomous driving. Where did you come from, phantom braking. And did I agree to those driver monitoring cameras capturing my every move? Could I have some privacy back please? Overall, it feels like automakers and tech companies are creating miniature frankensteins inside our cars. And ther...
Jun 08, 2023•32 min
Think of batteries for electric cars as the most important American industrial movement since WWII. Investors are pouring more than $100 billion into new battery plants across the country, from South Carolina to Georgia, from Ohio to Michigan. There's new battery factories coming up in Kansas, Texas and Arizona, too. These battery manufacturing sites are supported by a growing pack of new companies hell-bent on building out America's battery supply chains - minerals, processing and recycling. Am...
Jun 01, 2023•40 min
You may not know it yet but there is a great battle underway for your eyes and for your ears inside the car. That battle is taking place between two powerful competitors. In this corner, we have current hardware and software giants like Apple and Google. Most of us are already addicted to their weapons - smartphones. In that corner, we have giant global automakers who are racing to build up their software capabilities. Automakers like Mercedes-Benz envision a future world where you are so impres...
May 25, 2023•38 min
Drive the streets of San Diego and it will feel like the whole world is going electric. Here is a Tesla Model 3. There is a Hyundai Ioniq 5. Look at that Lucid Air. Or that cyber orange Mach E. Take your driving to the northern climes, like Detroit, Michiganor Green Bay, Wisconsin, and the picture looks totally different. There full-size pickup trucks and SUVs powered by gasoline engines rule the road. Electrics are simply hard to find, like some endangered species. What explains the dramatic di...
May 04, 2023•30 min
Ms. Lu Zhang moved from Inner Mongolia to the United States at the age of 20 to study material sciences at Stanford. Shortly after graduation, she founded her first company - one that made her independently wealthy. Today she leads Fusion Fund, a Palo-Alto based venture capital company that focuses on early stage investments. Ms Zhang is recognized as one of the top 25 leading female entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley. I met Lu at a private gathering of venture capital leaders gathering earlier thi...
Apr 20, 2023•44 min
Electric vehicles are expensive, out of reach for most customers. The average price of EVs sold in America last year was $65,000. The story in Europe was similar. China offers more affordable EVs. But they are driven by batteries that deliver dramatically lower range or power – or both. Who wants to buy an EV that is not quick off the start ? Or one that causes you range anxiety? Are we stuck in EVs-are-too-damn-expensive land forever? No, at least not for long, according to Vincent Pluvinage, t...
Apr 13, 2023•32 min
Most modern cars come with adaptive front lighting, park assist, surround-view and rear view cameras, lane departure warning, automatic emergency braking, adaptive cruise control, and collision avoidance. But how do these magical powers work? These systems use image sensors that continuously sample the vehicle’s operating environment. A machine vision processor in the system controller analyzes the data and determines what actions the car should take. Yes, we humans are still behind the wheel bu...
Apr 06, 2023•40 min
Powerhouse Ventures invests in early-stage software companies that save energy, save time – or both. Of the 33 companies in Powerhouse portfolio, several operate in the battery and electric charging arena. A few years ago, Ms Thompson made a monumental shift from the oil and gas industry in Texas to the clean energy focus that defines her work at Powerhouse. In our conversation, she introduces us to her approach to assessing software startups. What does she look for in the founder? And what does...
Mar 23, 2023•46 min
Electric vehicles remain expensive, out of reach for most customers. The average price of EVs sold in America last year was $65,000. The story in Europe was similar. China offers more affordable EVs, but they are driven by batteries that deliver dramatically lower range or power – or both. Who wants to buy an EV that is not quick off the start ? Or one that causes you range anxiety -- and sometimes range panic? Are we stuck in EVs-are-too-damn-expensive land forever? No, at least not for long, a...
Mar 16, 2023•41 min
In late 2022 and early 2023, customers from Ford, Rivian and Bolt separately reported an unusual and slightly terrifying experience while fast charging their vehicles. In the middle of their charge sessions, customers recalled hearing a large boom, then a pop. Seconds later, their charging stopped and their battery ceased to work. Tow trucks were summoned to take their vehicles to the nearest service center. EV expert John Voelcker joins us today to go deeper into what exactly happened. And he s...
Mar 09, 2023•45 min
Graphite is a core component of lithium-ion batteries, accounting for up to 30% of the value of a battery cell. Today, Chinese companies utterly dominate refining, producing 93% of all processed graphite globally. America is now hell-bent building its own batteries and battery supply chains. Since 2021, American car makers and battery manufacturers have announced more than $60 billion in new battery plants across the United States. Still, the US is totally reliant on China for graphite. But that...
Feb 17, 2023•30 min
Today’s charging experience in North America is, to be blunt, not good. New EV owners meet disappointment in the very first weeks of ownership. Some chargers are broken. Others are slow. Still others fail at software handshakes. When EV owners charge at a third party station like Electrify America or EVgo there are are too many “cooks” and too much complexity. I one owns the customer experience. Autel Energy North America aims to lift the “joy meter” of charging by delivering high quality charge...
Feb 09, 2023•35 min
Imagine a future in which car buyers choose a make and model based not on acceleration, handling and braking but on their digital cockpit experience. How well does the navigation work? How rich are the media options? How quick and intuitive is the interface. Guess what? That future is already here. People, especially younger people, want to enjoy their digital life inside the vehicles while they are in stop and go traffic delivering kids to school or going to work. In a recent survey of iPhone u...
Feb 02, 2023•42 min
Meet Joe Lowry, a man who in the battery minerals world is known as Mr Lithium. Lowry got his start in lithium at just about the same time that lithium ion batteries first started powering made-in-Japan consumer electronics like the Walkman. He has direct first hand experience working shoulder to shoulder iwt leading lithium players in Japan and in China. And he is on a first name basis with the founders in lithium mining from Australia to South America to North Carolina where he now lives. In t...
Jan 26, 2023•37 min
There are a lot of people in America and Europe willing to tell you that they "know China." In reality, very few Westerners really understand China. Fewer still can communicate what they know in clear and compelling terms. Then there is John Pomfret, a China veteran with deep hands-on experience. He is also an outstanding writer. Pomfret's landmark book, The Beautiful Country and The Middle Kingdom, is a tour de force that traces the relationship between the United States and China over the past...
Jan 19, 2023•44 min
Meet VinFast, Vietnam's young, bold and relentless EV champion. In late December, 2022, Madame Thuy Le, VinFast CEO, supervised operations at the port in Haiphong as the first 999 VinFast VF 8s were loaded aboard a ship to San Francisco. This month, American customers started taking delivery of the all-electric crossovers. The speed with which 5-year old VinFast started exporting cars to America is unprecedented. Remember that Japanese and Korean automakers worked for decades before gathering th...
Jan 12, 2023•37 min
Have you been searching for an expert go-to source for knowledge on batteries? Look no further, Battery Brunch is here. In 2019, MIT graduates and Silicon valley battery scientists Yen Yeh (Voltaiq), Linda Jing (Tesla) hosted the first ever Battery Brunch, a small gathering of a dozen battery minds in the Bay Area. Today, Battery Brunch has blossomed into a hugely valuable meeting point for thousands of people in the battery industry: founders, engineers, investors, policy makers and more. Yen Y...
Dec 29, 2022•28 min
In November, 2022 Lordstown Motors began delivering Endurance full-size electric trucks to fleet customers in America. Lordstown, named after the city in northeast, Ohio, represents an important new chapter in America's automotive manufacturing history. Lordstown is the designer and engineer of the electric vehicle. Samsung supplies the battery. And Foxconn, the powerhouse Taiwanese maker of our iPhones and iPads, is the manufacturer of the final product. This marks an important step in Foxconn'...
Dec 22, 2022•44 min
There is a once-in-a-hundred-years revolution underway in Europe. For many decades, cities in Europe have been built to serve the car. Now the mayors of cities like Paris, Amsterdam, Copenhagen and Brussels are taking steps to change roads into living spaces for people, bicycles, trees, flowers and kids playgrounds. People are taking to the streets to take back the streets. Cars are still welcome but now they are woven together with other ways to get around. This movement has been led by a cast ...
Dec 15, 2022•43 min
