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2025 Volvo EX90 now $3,300 more expensive thanks to materials costs

Without any fanfare, and with sharp surprise to some dealerships and reservation holders, Automotive News reports Volvo upped the price on all EX90 trims by $3,300. The automaker told the outlet that it raised prices on May 1, a month before the EX90 entered production after almost a year of delays. Volvo said it told its dealer body and reservation holders about the increase on June 26, the same day it informed reservation holders that the electric SUV would miss certain features on delivery and be programmed with workarounds for some unsolved issues like battery drainage when parked. The omissions include at least one of the lidar-centric safety systems that Volvo touted as putting the EX90 ahead of the competition when the car launched. The company told one reservation holder the software gaps would be filled in sometime in the "early ownership" phase, the only rational kind of non-answer available to automakers working through EV bugs. We couldn't find any active EX90 forum threads about the price increase, a strange absence for an anticipated vehicle with more than 10,000 preorders. In a Reddit thread from June 27, a commenter writes, "Just got my [EX90] customization email and the price has indeed increased to $79,995 + $1,295 destination fee," making it sound like being surprised by the automaker instead of being informed, such surprise matching a story another potential buyer told AN. And now a note on the EX90 configurator warns shoppers that "Ventilated Nordico is expected to be delivered towards the latter part of the estimated delivery time above." Since there are no delivery times yet, that means no ventilated seats for U.S. buyers for an unknown amount of time.  The new MSRPs figures for EX90 in base Twin Motor form after the $1,295 destination charge are:  Plus 7-seater: $81,290  Plus 6-seater: $81,790  Ultra 7-seater: $85,640  Ultra 6-seater: $86,140  Add $5,000 to these prices to for the Twin Motor Performance drivetrain. Both versions run off a 111-kWh battery from CATL. The first provides a total of 402 horsepower and 568 pound-feet of torque, and a 0-60 time of 5.7 seconds. The performance version is good for 496 horsepower and 671 pound-feet of torque, shrinking the 0-60 time to 4.7 seconds. A company spokesperson named rising materials costs as the culprit.

Volvo C40 Luggage Test: How much cargo space?

The Volvo C40 is the chopped-roof "coupe" version of the Volvo XC40, albeit without the internal combustion powertrain options. It's Recharge or nothing. As an electric vehicle, the C40 (or EC40 as it's apparently being renamed) is quite agreeable, with ample range and performance, plus a refined driving experience indicative of a Volvo that is quite clearly more sophisticated than the Hyundais, Kias and Volkswagens of the world. The interior up front is highly functional, too, with clever storage and good tech. Oh, and the gray wool upholstery is just beautiful.  But good grief, is the rear visibility atrocious. The back window is comparable to a pillbox and the blind spot is enormous. Worse, the various cameras supposedly on board to counter those flaws are just not effective. The rearview camera is mounted so low that its field of view is poor. The rearview camera mirror is susceptible to water droplets and condensation, and worse, the mirror housing is effectively pointed at the ceiling. That ceiling is glass and there is no shade. Ergo, if the sun is behind you, the amount of glare on the mirror renders it unviewable. If the roof is covered in condensation and the sun is behind you, there might as well be a brick mounted to the ceiling.  OK, I've gone off the rails here, but I just had to get that off my chest. The XC40 Recharge (or EX40 as it'll be called in the future), didn't have that problem, and I'm sure this isn't exactly a spoiler, it has a more usable cargo area, too.  Just in case it's not obvious, the C40/EC40 and XC40/EX40 is on the right. I'm done doing that / business, so I'm just going to make this future-proof from here on out. Volvo's specs say the EC40 has 17.3 cubic-feet of cargo space and specifically indicates that includes the underfloor storage area. When seemingly using that same measurement, the EX40 has 20.4. Honestly, I have no idea how that equates to the typically reported cubic-foot volume number of other manufacturers, but as a point of reference to each other, I'm going with those figures.  Both have an underfloor storage area, including a lid that cleverly props itself up so you can divide the cargo area for the purposes of keeping smaller items in place. There's also two little tabs that stick up specifically intended to loop grocery bags onto.  Now, I wrote off this area in the XC40 luggage test since it wasn't big enough to hold the smallest (fancy) bag, shown above in blue.

Geely plans to launch hundreds of satellites to guide autonomous cars

BEIJING — China's Zhejiang Geely Holding Group said on Tuesday it was investing 2.27 billion yuan ($326 million) in a new satellite manufacturing plant, where it plans to build low-orbit satellites to provide more accurate data for self-driving cars. Geely, one of China's most internationally-known companies due to its investments in Daimler, Volvo and Proton, is building the facilities in Taizhou, where it has car plants. It aims to produce 500 satellites a year by around 2025, with around 300 highly-skilled staff, it said in a statement. Geely's technology development arm, Geely Technology Group, launched Geespace to research, launch, and operate low-orbit satellites in 2018. Geespace will begin the launch of its commercial low-orbit satellite network by the end of this year, Geely said. Geely said low-orbit satellites would offer high speed internet connectivity, precise navigation, and cloud computing capabilities to cars with autonomous driving technology. Geely, which sold 2.18 million cars last year, is among global automakers from Tesla to Toyota to pursue autonomous driving technologies. It is building low-orbit satellites to meet demand for high-speed connectivity capabilities that can deliver fast software updates. From around 2025, Geely's cars will have more functions to connect to the satellites. Related Video: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.     Green Plants/Manufacturing Mercedes-Benz Volvo Emerging Technologies Autonomous Vehicles