Super Nice And Clean! on 2040-cars

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GM cutting production at two plants

General Motors is continuing to adjust to excess supply of some of its brands' models. To get production more in line with the vehicles' actual demand, the automotive giant is idling two of its factories in North America in the coming months. The Orion Assembly plant is going to be down from March 9-13, according to an anonymous plant worker and another insider speaking to Automotive News. The factory builds the Chevrolet Sonic and Buick Verano, but there are plenty of both models sitting on dealer lots, including 216 days worth of Sonics, according to AN. The factory already had two idle periods announced to reduce the excess. In addition, downtime is scheduled at GM's "Flex" line at the Oshawa, Ontario, Canada, plant from April 13-17. This affects supply of the Chevrolet Camaro, Impala, Buick Regal and Cadillac XTS. Among them, the automotive giant has the largest supply of Regals ready for dealers with 213 days worth of them, according to AN. The future for the whole Oshawa factory is cloudy in general, though. There are rumors that it could close entirely in the future because the Camaro is leaving and the Regal and XTS might not last much longer than 2017. The Canadian government and the labor union there intend to put up a fight, though. News Source: Automotive News - sub. req.Image Credit: Bill Pugliano / Getty Images Plants/Manufacturing Buick Cadillac Chevrolet GM orion assembly oshawa plant idle

GM CEO Mary Barra predicts mass electrification will take decades

General Motors is allocating a substantial amount of money to the development of electric technology, but Mary Barra, the firm's CEO, conceded that battery-powered cars won't fully replace their gasoline-burning counterparts for several decades. She stressed the shift is ongoing, but she hinted it will be slower than many assume. "We believe the transition will happen over time," affirmed Barra on "Leadership Live with David Rubenstein," a talk show aired by Bloomberg Television. She added that not every car will be electric in 2040. "It will happen in a little bit longer period, but it will happen," she told the host. She was presumably talking about the United States market; the situation is markedly different in Europe and in China, where strict government regulations (and even stricter ones on the horizon) are accelerating the shift towards electric cars. On the surface, it doesn't look like General Motors has much invested in electrification; the only battery-powered model it sells in America in 2020 is the Chevrolet Bolt (pictured), which undeniably remains a niche vehicle. Sales totaled 16,418 units in 2019, meaning the Corvette beat it by about 1,500 sales. In comparison, Cadillac sold 35,424 examples of the aging last-generation Escalade during the same time period. And yet, the company isn't giving up. It has numerous electric models in the pipeline including a slightly larger version of the aforementioned Bolt, the much-hyped GMC Hummer pickup, and an electric crossover assigned to the Cadillac brand. These models (and others) will use the Ultium battery technology that General Motors is currently developing. Its engineers are also working on a modular platform capable of underpinning a wide variety of cars. Bringing these innovations to the market is a Herculean task. EVs may not take over for decades, but Barra and her team must believe their 2% market share will increase significantly in the coming years if they're approving these programs. Autonomous technology is even costlier, more complicated, and more time-consuming to develop. Barra nonetheless expects to see the first General Motors-built driverless vehicles on the road by 2025. "I definitely think it will happen within the next five years. Our Cruise team is continuing to develop technology so it's safer than a human driver. I think you'll see it clearly within five years," she said on the same talk show. Her statement is vague but realistic.

The 2021 Cadillac Escalade's triple curved OLED screens are gorgeous

The centerpiece and crown jewel of the 2021 Cadillac Escalade is the triple OLED screen setup facing the passengers. It’s an imposing cowl with 38 inches of screen real estate in total, and itÂ’s a Cadillac Escalade-exclusive piece of technology. An interesting and unique feature like this has the potential to set Cadillac apart from the stiff competition in the luxury space.  Its appearance is just like that of the Cadillac Escala concept. We donÂ’t often get to see interior concepts carried into production, so thatÂ’s exciting on its own. The layout consists of a 16.9-inch touchscreen infotainment system, a 14.2-inch instrument cluster and a 7.2-inch touchscreen to the left of the cluster. All of the screens are curved and use OLED technology, which is commonly used on the screen of your Android phone, iPhone or TV. It allows for the deepest blacks, best contrast ratios and extremely vivid colors. In short, an OLED screen is going to look better than an LCD screen, and thatÂ’s why Cadillac is using it. We sat down with a few folks who could tell us more about it. Phil Kucera, Cadillac interior design manager, gave us some background on the decision to implement this tri-screen layout. “To be honest with you, it was a high-end leadership decision,” Kucera says. “There was a lot of, 'Hey maybe we donÂ’t put that on the base level. And why do you have to use OLED?' Because OLED is not the cheap way to go. So the fact that it stayed that size and remained OLED Â… I would bet that youÂ’re going to see other people doing something like this. There was a real push to try and get here first.” Sounds like the screen could have ultimately been a victim of cost-cutting measures. WeÂ’re glad it made it into production, because it looks promising. Sameer Gupta, GM's engineer manager responsible for infotainment, walked us through the new digital landscape. If you didnÂ’t like the old Cadillac software from before, youÂ’ll be happy to learn that this system is a completely new user interface, sharing nothing with any software before. Gupta told us that this is “a complete first-of use of this interface.” “When we started doing the system, we envisioned a system that had rich graphics, but was also simple and adaptive,” Gupta told us. After spending some time poking around in an Escalade, we can report that the new menus are full of rich graphics, pleasing animations and snappy transitions.