IT WON'T BE LONG NOW.

Editor's Note: This week, Peter dissects the perpetual state of limbo that the car companies find themselves in, and he asserts that the auto industry is teetering on the brink once again. In On The Table, Mercedes-Benz presses ahead with its latest EV entry, the all-electric CLA. Our AE Song of the Week is the ferocious "Good Times, Bad Times" by Led Zeppelin In Fumes, Peter wraps-up his series about Jim Hall's Chaparrals. And in The Line, we have F1 results from Qatar. Onward! -WG

By Peter M. De Lorenzo

Detroit. It’s a hard knock life, or something like that. The Auto Biz as we know it is a rollicking, rolling, seething cauldron; an up-at-down pride swallowing siege; a swirling maelstrom marked by waves of seismic shifts between good, bad and incomprehensible.

We’re used to hearing about “uncharted waters” in all aspects of life of late, but the Auto Biz has been wallowing in a perpetual state of “uncharted waters” for decades. It’s just part of the business.

 

Things going great? Just wait five minutes. Nonsensical tariffs, factory fires, oversold EV investments, questionable product decisions based on those investments, trying to pretend that consumer demand for anything other than SUVs, trucks or crossovers will end anytime soon.

 

And then there are the CEOs, careening from one “can’t-miss” idea to another, not really delivering on anything, but incessantly talking, talking, and talking some more.

 

GM CEO Mary Barra is constantly promising a “next-level” GM - a connected, ideally situated, AI-savvy and dialed-in entity. Her fascination with Silicon Valley operatives is now legendary, and it has repeatedly backfired on her, with the latest hires fading away on a regular basis, pronouncing everything is cool with GM on their way out the door, but apparently not cool enough for them to stay on longer than a year, and sometimes much less. In the meantime, the True Believers remain the cooler heads, executing the company’s ICE vehicle portfolio to a high degree, and delivering the profits needed to power the whole enterprise.

 

There’s the ubiquitous Jim Farley at Ford, running here, there and everywhere, insisting that everything is cool over in Dearborn when things suggest that isn’t necessarily the case. It seems that there is a constant kaleidoscope of problems hovering over Ford, any of which could derail any positive momentum at a moment’s notice. Some observers say the company is just mired in contrasts. I prefer to think that it is mired in chaos, much of it generated by the constantly changing whims of its CEO. Again, without the F-150 juggernaut, where would Ford be?

 

And what of Antonio Filosa at Stellantis? As I said last week, we’ve been buried in press releases touting a “new” highly-focused Stellantis, a company that will be responsive to its dealers, kinder to its suppliers (after consistently being loathed by the entire industry for the company’s egregious behavior) and a company that’s all about all about product, product, product. But the intro of a $66,000 Jeep Recon EV, which is the hands-down winner of our 2025 “Answer to The Question That Absolutely No One is Asking” Award, gives us pause. This is a product that was clearly in the works before the giant EV crash took hold of the U.S. market, and Stellantis apparently had no choice but to release it given the huge amounts of development cash sunk into it. But it smells like “marketing by gunpoint” and it makes me question the optimism out in Auburn Hills. That collective sigh you here coming from out in Auburn Hills? It’s because they’re relieved they have Ram pickup trucks, pure and simple.

 

The rest of the industry is teetering on the brink. Take Porsche, for instance. This was a company that generated so much profit only a few years ago that the good times seemed never ending. But the self-described “most profitable car company in the world” (a claim that always rang hollow to me given the enduring presence of Ferrari. In other words, Porsche’s claim was unmitigated bullshit) finds itself on the ropes. Why? They overcommitted to EV development. So much so, in fact, that the company is now backtracking to bolster its ICE lineup to generate profits. That didn’t prevent Porsche from introducing the EV version of its new Cayenne last week, which suggests to me that it had no choice given the piles of development money it represents. Given Porsche’s mindset, of course, it’s already pronouncing the Cayenne EV a huge success. That remains a yet-to-be determined proposition, in other words, a giant “we’ll see.”

 

Mercedes-Benz is another car company buried in its EV development investments. Just this past week it introduced an all-new Electric CLA (See this week's "On The Table" -WG), which by all early indications seems to be a fine piece. Kudos to Mercedes for still believing in building actual cars for a change, which is refreshing. But who is going to buy it at $50,000 plus options? It’s a good thing Mercedes-Benz has a full array of ICE vehicles to fall back on.

 

What about Audi? It’s flailing, with its marketing plan for its 2026 Q3 consisting of adding $4,000 to its sticker price (to cover the Tariff) and calling it good. Then what?

 

And the new Nissan CEO, Ivan Espinosa, has an “aggressive’ three-year revival plan for the brand, but the burning question remains: Will Nissan be around in three years? It is far from guaranteed, and that’s being charitable.

 

Polestar and Rivian are seriously floundering, with their marketing strategies apparently consisting of waiting for consumer demand in EVs to ramp-up again. In other words, a giant bowl of Not Good.

And then we have Scout, the VW-backed EV that’s “just around the corner,” based on the national advertising being aired right now. Except that the likelihood of actually being able to buy one won’t happen until, are you ready? 2028. Flat-out crazy.

 

I could go on, but after talking to people and hearing the refrain “It Won’t Be Long Now!” from all corners of the business insisting that things will get better again, I’m wondering if people are just operating in “shell shocked” mode, confined to wishing and hoping that some how, some way, things will all work out.

 

Because to do otherwise at this juncture would mean facing the High-Octane Truth: This business is teetering on the brink, yet again.

 

Thus, it was ever so.

 

And that’s the High-Octane Truth for this week.

Editor's Note: Click on "Next 1 Entries" at the bottom of this page to see previous issues. - WG