Porsche reported a $1.1 billion loss in the third quarter, compared to a $1.1 billion profit in the same period last year. Get all the latest auto industry news in the Executive Briefing.
Today’s headlines:
+ Federal authorities are seeking information from Tesla about a new self-driving mode dubbed “Mad Max” that users report will operate at faster than posted speed limits. More at World Auto Forum.
+ General Motors eliminated around 200 salaried jobs, mainly at the Warren Tech Center, days after raising its profit guidance for the year in a move that sent the shares soaring. More at The Detroit News.
+ The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has opened a probe into about 232,209 Jeep Gladiators and Wranglers with a suspected instrument panel defect. More at NTD News.
+ A TV station in Chicago was duped by an AI-generated video posted on the satirical Weaber Valley Speedway Facebook page that showed an entire field of race cars crashing. More at The Drive.
+ Denny Hamlin, Chase Briscoe, William Byron, and Kyle Larson are the final four drivers who will compete for the 2025 NASCAR Cup title in the season finale at Phoenix. More at The Tennessean.
+ Rivian will pay $250 million to settle a 2022 class-action lawsuit accusing the EV maker of misleading investors about vehicle pricing during its 2021 initial public offering. More at CBT News.
+ Tesla CEO Elon Musk is reportedly dealing off thousands of slow-selling Cybertrucks to his other enterprises, including SpaceX and XAI, his artificial intelligence company. More at Autoblog.
+ Mattel’s Hot Wheels brand is now offering all the cars and drivers on the 2025 Formula 1 grid in 1:64 scale, in its standard bubble pack line or in a premium series. More at Car and Driver.
+ Porsche swung to a bigger-than-expected operating loss in the third quarter, plunging the German carmaker deeper into crisis as it battles sinking sales in China. More at MSN News.
+ McLaren driver Lando Norris scored a dominating win in the Mexico City Grand Prix to take the lead in the Formula 1 Driver’s Championship for the first time this season. More at The Guardian.
Photo courtesy of Porsche.
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Another 2¢: Are human drivers and internal combustion engines under attack and sabotaged now for some reason, or could the root-cause of the record breaking safety recall outbreak be outsourcing of R&D and rubberstamping quality? Or both?
Self drivers, years away from an emergency double lane change much less any actual genuine wheel to wheel competition, the virtual reality AI hallucination riddle is decades away from being solved IMHO. According to Google, the term “hallucination” is metaphorical, as AI does not have a human brain capable of delusions. Instead, it can generate plausible but inaccurate outputs because it relies on patterns from its training data, rather than on a true understanding of the world…
I drove a Tesla with FSD and every update for five years. The system was impressive but not true self-driving, and also annoying. The more serious and engaged driver you are, the less you will like Tesla FSD. It’s very impressive for what it is, but in the final assessment it drives like a 16 yr-old on a learner’s permit. I shut the thing off except to check out the updates.
I believe true self-driving will happen fairly soon, but not with the vision-only approach of Tesla. I also believe the market for it is considerably smaller than imagined. I think most buyers will prefer limited driver aids at a fraction of the cost.
The challenge of autonomous vehicles is often misunderstood. The task would be far easier if we got all the humans off the road. Picture the robot trucks in an Amazon warehouse. Machines work according to a simple instruction set from which they never vary. Human drivers operate from a nearly infinite instruction set from which they can deviate at any time.
From the internet-
Until all human driving in the United States is deemed illegal by hook, by crook or whatever, ask yourselves what is the safest way to transport your child to school everyday if the choices are –
A. A trained, skilled, competent, caring, licensed and safe human driver.
B. Highly complex AI model with a vast number of parameters that can exhibit unpredictable behavior, prone to generating novel but erroneous information but can always enter a “Minimal Risk Condition (MRC)” if it’s confidence in its perception drops below a safe threshold; or if something breaks, fails or goes wrong, the self driver will enter a “minimal risk” state. At freeway speeds, this means it will “safely” slow down, activate its hazard lights, and pull over to the side of the road if possible.
C. Human-in-the-loop oversight: Some but not all self driving systems incorporate remote human operators who can be called upon to assess and resolve complex, ambiguous situations, emergencies or failures that the AI cannot confidently resolve (with reaction times measured with a sundial)…