Brampton Assembly built the Challenger until the line stopped in December 2023. Photo: Ermell / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
In today's issue:
A Chinese automaker asks about an idled Stellantis plant the same week Unifor sits down to negotiate its fate
J.D. Power says a third of owners never touch the passenger screen automakers keep installing
Bentley strips 1,000 pounds off a Continental and builds the sports car it never has
PLANT FOR SALE, INQUIRE WITHIN
BYD approached Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown about six months ago to ask about making buses at Stellantis's idled Brampton Assembly Plant, Brown said, per Automotive News and Transport Topics. Stellantis said it has nothing to announce and that its "focus remains on finding a sustainable manufacturing solution for Brampton Assembly."
BYD was not the only caller. Brown also heard from an unnamed Italian automaker and from Canadian defence firms Roshel and Dominion Dynamics, which want to build armored vehicles and drones. He also heard from Leapmotor International, which is Stellantis's own joint venture with Zhejiang Leapmotor: one arm of the company asking about a plant another arm says has no business case, per Automotive News.
Unifor opened contract talks with Stellantis today, Sept. 1, with the current agreement expiring Sept. 20 and Brampton's future "central" to negotiations, per Automotive News.
Local 444 president James Stewart called it a "fight for our lives" in a Facebook rally the day before talks began, said Stellantis's "intention is to sell that facility" and that the union does not accept it, and set Sept. 11 as the union's internal deadline for a deal, per Automotive News.
Brampton last built a vehicle in December 2023. Its promised Jeep Compass program went to Illinois, and about 2,200 members are laid off there, per Automotive News. Most Canadian-built vehicles are exported to the US, where tariff escalation is squeezing margins, per Transport Topics.
Brown's disclosure lands days after Unifor ratified a separate C$1.1 billion GM contract covering Oshawa and CAMI, per Just Auto, giving the union a fresh precedent to point to across the table.
Stellantis has spent two years treating Brampton as a cost to shed. The mayor's disclosure reframes it as an asset other people want, and he made it public on the eve of the talks where Stellantis has to argue the opposite. Whether the buyers are real matters less this month than the fact that Unifor can now name them across the table.
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Also worth knowing
The Atlas cost VW half its margin, and that is why Wolfsburg took the US back: When we covered Kjell Gruner's exit and Marco Schubert's appointment on Aug. 8, the number behind it was not public. VW earned about $10,000 per vehicle on the old Atlas; company insiders put the new one closer to $5,000 after higher-grade components were added during a development cycle the North American organization was handed to run. The change also cascades: VW brand sales chief Martin Sander moves to Audi, Skoda's Martin Jahn succeeds him, per Automotive News Europe and Autoblog. #analyst
A third of owners never touch their passenger screen: J.D. Power found 35% of owners with a passenger display say they've never used it, and only 6% use it every drive, while the feature logs 21.3 problems per 100 vehicles, per Motor1 and Jalopnik. #market
Photo: Audi
Hyundai's hybrids set a record while its total slips: Hybrid sales rose 33% to an August record and now make up 29% of Hyundai's mix, even as total US sales fell 2% to 86,977, per Hyundai. Honda deliveries rose 1% to 133,996 over the same month, per Automotive News. #market
Photo: Hyundai
Toyota will build its next flagship Lexus EV in China, not Japan: Nikkei reports the next-generation Lexus electric SUV goes into production at Toyota's wholly owned Shanghai plant from autumn 2027, the first time a next-gen Toyota model with its latest production technology launches in China ahead of Japan. Toyota scrapped plans earlier this year to develop the flagship Lexus EV at home, and its China sales fell 18% through July, per Electrek and CarExpert. #analyst
Reveals & culture
Ferrari's Monza livery is a Schumacher tribute, 30 years later: The SF-26 cars run a one-off scheme marking 30 years since Schumacher joined Maranello and his first Italian GP win in 1996, per Ferrari and RaceFans. #enthusiast
Bentley finally builds a Continental for the track: The 2027 Supersports cuts roughly 1,000 pounds, drops the hybrid assist, sends 657 hp to the rear wheels only, and costs $490,350 with production capped at 500 units, per Car and Driver and Edmunds. #enthusiast
Photo: Bentley
Recalls & legal action
Ford recalls 149,000 Mustangs over a wiring fault that can kill drive power: Engine-compartment wiring harness ground connections on 2024-2026 Mustangs may fracture, causing a loss of drive power or knocking out the headlights, windshield washer, air conditioning and engine cooling fan. NHTSA logged it as campaign 26V547000 on Aug. 25, citing non-compliance with the federal standards covering lamps and windshield washing, per NHTSA and Ford Authority. → If you own one: The repair is free but is not expected until March 2027, so until then treat the symptoms as the warning. A headlight, washer, air conditioning or cooling-fan failure on a 2024-2026 Mustang is the ground terminal announcing itself, and it means a dealer visit now, not a wait for the letter. Check your VIN at NHTSA.gov under 26V547000; Ford's number is 26C40. #news
Quick links
Lexus refreshes the NX for 2027: The mid-cycle update brings a frameless spindle grille, an ES-derived interior, and Lexus's sixth-generation hybrid system to its best-selling SUV, per Motor1.
Genesis expands into Europe despite a 19% sales drop: Hyundai's luxury brand will add four European markets next year even as its regional sales fell 19%, betting expansion and electrification can offset a market dominated by BMW and Mercedes, per Automotive News Europe.
Gentex is chasing a dimmable sunroof that isn't made of glass: The supplier has spent about three and a half years adapting its electrochromic coating to work on plastic rather than glass, and says the engineering work is roughly 85% complete with no production start date set, per Automotive News.
Nissan pulls the Rogue Hybrid forward for the second time: The e-Power version of Nissan's best-selling nameplate now arrives in November rather than January, in one upper trim, one or two units per dealership, with supply reaching about 6,000 by March. US sales chief Tiago Castro expects hybrids to be about 30% of Rogue volume by mid-2027, per Automotive News and InsideEVs.
Photo: Nissan
Yesterday's picks
Honda and Nissan Bury the Merger, Keep the Software: Honda and Nissan signed a joint development agreement Aug. 31 to standardize ECUs, the in-vehicle operating system, middleware and vehicle-control software for models launching in fiscal 2029, per Automotive News.
BYD's overseas revenue passes its home market for the first time: BYD's first-half overseas sales rose 34% and outearned domestic revenue for the first time, per Automotive News. Total H1 revenue still fell 7.13% year over year to RMB 344.8 billion ($51.2 billion) as net profit dropped 20.54% to RMB 12.3 billion ($1.83 billion), per chinaevhome.com. Q2 alone was a rebound, up roughly 30% year over year to 8.2 billion yuan, ending four straight quarterly declines, per Autoblog.
Rates fell to a four-year low and the payment still set a record: The average new-vehicle loan rate fell to 6.55% in August, the lowest August reading since 2022, and the average monthly payment still hit the highest level any August has produced, per J.D. Power and GlobalData's August forecast as reported by GoodCarBadCar. Thomas King, president of OEM solutions at J.D. Power, puts the gap down to trade-in equity rather than to price or rates: 28.8% of trade-ins carried negative equity, up 0.6 points year over year, and 13.9% of new loans now run 84 months or longer, up 2.1 points, per the same forecast. Incentive spending is running at $3,384 per unit, up 5.9%. The likely mechanism, though J.D. Power does not spell it out: buyers trading in today largely bought at the 2021 and 2022 inventory-shortage peak on terms long enough that they are still inside them, so the car they arrive in is a liability rather than a down payment, and it rolls into the next loan.
Worth a listen
One episode from Car Curious, our sister car-podcast platform, picked out of everything the shows published in the last day.
Is Flat Rate Driving Young Technicians Out of the Trade? with Tanner Watters (The Jaded Mechanic Podcast): Tanner Watters explains how dealers pushing technicians fully into flat-rate compensation creates a breaking point where young mechanics choose to leave the trade entirely.
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