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Mitsubishi and NTT to buy 30% stake in HERE digital mapping company

Digital mapping company HERE Technologies sold a 30% stake to Mitsubishi and Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp (NTT), diluting German carmakers’ stake to 54% amid uncertainty about the profit potential from autonomous cars. Mitsubishi and NTT will co-invest in the Amsterdam-headquartered company through their newly established, jointly owned holding firm COCO Tech Holding B.V. in the Netherlands, HERE said on Friday. “Their investment also means we are further diversifying our shareholder base beyond automotive, which is important given the appeal and necessity of location technology across geographies and industries,” HEREÂ’s Chief Executive Edzard Overbeek said. The Japanese companies said they would collaborate with HERE to develop services such as ways to tackle road congestion and improve supply chain efficiencies. High definition maps can also be used in fleet management, asset tracking, last-mile delivery, long-distance package delivery by drones and indoor mapping applications, Overbeek told Reuters. Financial details of the transaction, which they said would close next year, were not disclosed. German carmakers BMW, Audi and Daimler saw high definition mapping as a strategic asset and bought HERE from Finnish telecoms group Nokia for around 2.5 billion euros ($2.8 billion) in 2015 to avoid becoming dependent on AlphabetÂ’s Google. FridayÂ’s deal dilutes the stake held by each German carmaker from 25% to just under 18%, HERE said. REALITY CHECK Tech companies and automakers raced to develop self-driving vehicles after Google presented a prototype car in 2012, leading German manufacturers to develop robotaxis as a way to enter the ride-hailing business to take on Uber. However, the technology costs and regulatory hurdles have spiraled, and ride-hailing businesses have struggled to reach sustainable profitability, leading to a reassessment of the business potential of robotaxis and ride hailing. “There has been a reality check setting in here,” Daimler Chief Executive Ola Kaellenius said last month, adding that spending on robotaxis would be “rightsized.” The move comes as BMW and Daimler this week announced they will exit the North American car-sharing market, halting operations in Montreal, New York, Seattle, Washington D.C., and Vancouver, as they focus on the European market. Last year, GermanyÂ’s Continental and Bosch, the worldÂ’s largest automotive suppliers, bought a 5% stake in HERE.

The Mitsubishi Outlander third row has actually been far worse

It's rare for a compact SUV to have a third row, and there's a good reason for that: Few humans can actually fit in such a tiny space. And sure, there are obviously kids, but they usually require some sort of child seat that's not fitting back there, either.  In other words, the use case is as tiny as the seats themselves. No wonder, then, that there are only two three-row compact SUVs: the 2022 Volkswagen Tiguan and the 2022 Mitsubishi Outlander. While I have yet to witness the Tiguan, the above photo is the result of fitting a 6-foot-3 automotive editor into the Outlander's third row. It ain't pretty. And that's with the middle row pushed all the way forward. Also note that it's just not a matter of legroom — headroom is terrible, too.  Obviously, this is an extreme and ridiculous test. In the end, the need to accommodate the third row almost certainly allows the Outlander to have more cargo space than average (and the mechanically related Nissan Rogue) even if it's presence is also likely the reason it doesn't have as much room as the CR-V, RAV4 and Tucson (more on that coming soon in a luggage test). It's basically a bonus feature, and if you can in fact use it, great! It's also exponentially better than the original Outlander third row. Specifically, the second-generation model that had a shockingly flimsy design that would've been rickety for the 1980s let alone the late 2000s. It consisted of a mesh fabric pulled over a tube steel ring. It was more like a beach chair than something that belonged in a moving vehicle.  Here are two period videos of me demonstrating it in a 2010 Outlander. In the first, I raise the seat, showing how difficult it was to do and how rickety it was once in place. The second video shows the mesh seat bottom.  Video 1: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. Video 2: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings.

Mitsubishi CA-MiEV and GR-HEV concepts peek out before debut

We're getting a look at the two star Mitsubishi concept cars from this year's Geneva soiree, just ahead of the official debut for both. As suits Mitsubishi's ever-deepening interest in electrified vehicles, the brace of concepts both make use of electric drive: the CA-MiEV being a pure electric vehicle and the GR-HEV using a diesel-electric powertrain.
The CA-MiEV concept car may look a bit like a photoshopped Toyota Prius, but in fact the car employs a new electric motor and battery system from Mitsu. We're told that the EV has a theoretical range of 186 miles, which is nearly double the range of most EVs on the market today and approaches Tesla territory. The vehicle is larger than the company's current i-MiEV, and would seem to point the way forward for a more mainstream production EV from Mitsu.
The second concept, a rather odd-looking pickup truck called the GR-HEV, has a diesel engine, electric motor, all-wheel drive, and Mitsubishi's Super All Wheel Control. The front fascia bears a version of the grille we've seen on the new Outlander PHEV, with more radically raked (sort of "smiling") lighting elements.