Electric Vehicles

Companies that build products and technology for the EV market without actually manufacturing the cars themselves may offer investors opportunities they haven’t considered.

Real Money’s Jim Collins explored this idea recently in a piece identifying some of the plays he’s keeping an eye on: Read Here Are 5 Electric Vehicle Accessory and Tech Names to Watch; and get more of his trading ideas and investing strategies.

Collins writes: “In the interest of presenting some compelling emerging growth ideas in this mega-cap-dominated market, I decided to run with the ball myself.

“The companies you really should be watching? Exro Technologies EXROF, Lomiko Metals LMRMF, Naqi Logix, Nano One Materials NNOMF and Vicinity Motor VEV.”

What’s the theme among these disparate companies? All of them build products and technology for the EV market without actually manufacturing the cars themselves.

Collins says that in an emerging space, the best thing you can do is pick the right winners. Investors who can successfully pick the car companies that will dominate electric vehicles, they’ll do very well.

But when there’s no good way to know who will win or lose in advance, the next best thing is to invest in the industry at large. Buy stock in the companies that build things every electric vehicle will need. It doesn’t matter whether Tesla  (TSLA) – Get Tesla Inc Report, Ford  (F) – Get Ford Motor Company Report or General Motors  (GM) – Get General Motors Company (GM) Report crushes this market, you’ll be sitting on a stock with value to any (or every) winner.

For example, Collins writes:

“Massive opportunities exist for both Nano and Exro. Nano’s patented One-Pot process and proprietary M2CAM technology can vastly improve the performance and durability of the cathode in an electric vehicle battery, while lowering the carbon density of the materials that are shipped (on ships powered by hydrocarbons) from disparate regions to EV battery manufacturers. 

“Exro’s coil drivers enable multiple torque profiles from an EV powertrain, especially useful at the larger (trucks, buses, trains) and smaller ends (e-bikes, scooters) of the transportation spectrum. Exro also has a proprietary battery control technology, which will enable current-gen lithium-ion battery stacks to gain a second life instead of heading to a landfill.”

Get more trading strategies and investing insights from the contributors on Real Money.

This is exactly the kind of industry-wide infrastructure that investors can look for. If you think the EV industry will do well as a whole, you can try to capitalize on that success by investing in the companies that will underpin the entire sector. 

HOLLAND — The mission of the Outdoor Discovery Center is to advance outdoor education and conservation in West Michigan. 

Driven by this mission, our organization has a keen interest in transportation options that reduce negative impacts on the environment.

Thanks to advancing technology, electric vehicles (EVs) have emerged as a cleaner, more efficient alternative to traditional combustion engine vehicles. 

Seeing an opportunity to provide drivers with entertainment, education and exercise opportunities while their batteries are recharging, the ODC installed its first EV charger in 2015.

Fast forward six years and the demand for use of our electric vehicle charger has grown beyond the single charger we had.

With contributions from a Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy grant program and the White Pine Fund, we recently installed two new charging stations providing a total of four standard charging plug-ins available for public use.

Each pedestal has two charging units, suitably named “Juice Box,” which are 40-amp commercial EV chargers. 

These chargers are powered in part by clean, renewable energy produced at the ODC.

Three solar arrays on the property produce over 40 percent of the electricity that the ODC consumes each year — even through Michigan’s cloudy winter season. 

One of the charging stations is sometimes occupied by our electric vehicle, a 2020 Chevrolet Bolt. We chose the Bolt because it leans into our mission of conservation and education while demonstrating the value of greener transportation options.

Wider availability of electric cars from more automakers means prices have started to ratchet downward, but that doesn’t mean EVs are cheap to insure.

MoneyGeek.com compared several electric cars against their similarly sized, gas-fueled counterparts from the same automakers and discovered all were at least a little more expensive to insure.

The Karnataka government is planning to offer sops to electric vehicle (EV) startups to retrofit petrol-powered two- and three-wheelers to make them electric.

“We want to look at it from the demand side, and give a policy push to drive demand,” a senior government official, who is part of negotiations with stakeholders, told ET. By policy push, the officials hinted at offering incentives to startups, but they added that the talks are at a very early stage.

Karnataka was ahead of other states when it came up with an electric vehicles and battery storage policy in 2017. The government, however, has not been satisfied with the speed of EV adoption by stakeholders, and it is in this context that the government is examining a policy nudge.

Industries minister Murugesh Nirani told ET that the government is working on options to push the transportation sector towards clean-energy options as a way to battle vehicular pollution. He said electric vehicles have a promising future as energy from renewable sources is available in plenty, and cheaper operational costs will make EVs attractive to users.

Many startups in cities including Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Gurgaon and Pune have been working in the area, developing conversion kits that can be retrofitted into vehicles to convert them into either a wholly electric vehicle or a hybrid one. These firms are hopeful that rising petrol prices will make a large number of people switch to electric mobility.

“People won’t switch to EV until their existing scooter’s life is done. Best way to accelerate an EV is to retrofit it to EV,” said HR Vivekananda, CEO at Bounce, a ride-share company which has already transformed about 100 bikes into EVs. “For this to be encouraged, subsidy on retrofit is required.”

The industries department is confident of securing all regulatory certifications for such retrofitted vehicles in order to help them find ready market acceptance. For now, it is planning to focus on only two- and three-wheelers.

The officials in the industries department said that once they are ready with a policy framework, Nirani as well as the finance department will study it before placing it before the Cabinet for approval.

The finance department will have to make allocations if the proposed policy were to involve expenditure from the government side, the official said.

Vivekananda said, “Millions of petrol scooters can be quickly converted to electric and it also comes with the lowest carbon footprint. It’s also an effective way of scrapping.”

Mobility has advanced a lot since the old faithful horse, first to 4 wheeled vehicles with an internal combustion engine, and now Electric Vehicles (EVs) are the next big thing. And they are here now!

Many were unsure about the new technology and reliability of an internal combustion engine over a horse when it debuted but today, we couldn’t imagine having to ride a horse all the way to Perth.

Now we are seeing more and more global manufacturers embracing electric mobility with the most recent being General Motors (GM), they plan to cease manufacturing internal combustion engines by 2035 and will have 30 new EVs available by 2025.

GM are joining other manufacturers who have pledged similar targets, like VW, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Ford, Volvo, and Toyota. Not all are completely ceasing production of internal combustion cars, but they are moving their Research & Development over to EVs, painting the picture of where the companies are heading.

Countries are also setting targets to ban the sale of new internal combustion cars like; the UK, France, China & Singapore, just to name a few. These targets set the scene for other countries and the manufacturers of the world.

What EVs are available in Australia, and why buy one?

They say there are currently 3 types of people who buy EVs, people who like going fast, people who like technology, and people who are environmentally conscious. As more EVs become available, everyday people are starting to buy them. They now start from $44k and generally have ranges from 200km to 600+km with current battery technology.

Some manufacturers are releasing cars in the next year or 2 with ranges up to 1000km. Companies that currently sell EVs in Australia are Hyundai, Nissan, KIA, Mazda, Mercedes-Benz, Jaguar, Audi, Tesla, Porsche, BMW, Mini, BYD, ACE, and MG with more on the way.

If you are interested in EVs there are events where you can go for a test ride with owners and other enthusiasts. There is a Facebook page called EV meets where you can chat with owners and look at their cars. Alternatively, you can go to a dealer and take one for a test drive. There are also online platforms like evee.com.au where you can hire one.

I did that a year ago to see if one would work for me living in the country. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and would highly recommend hiring before buying.

The car I hired was a Tesla Model 3 Standard Range Plus (SR+), that has a realistic range of about 330-360km of highway speed driving. In late December 2020, I purchased the latest Model 3. In summer I have found it to consistently get me to Perth from Moora (180km) with just over 50% battery remaining.

In the colder months of winter, you can expect the range to drop as batteries run less efficiently in the cold. In winter I have seen the car use 60% to get me to Perth (10% more than summer).

Charging times vary depending on the type of charging station, ranging from 20 mins up to 4hrs. The time it takes to charge depends on what percentage you have left and what rate of charge the station offers. Since I am still getting used to the car, when I drive to Perth and return on the same day, I like to give it a small charge so I leave Perth with no less than 70%.

A charge from around 50% up to 70% would commonly take from 10 mins to an hour depending on the type of charger available.

With an EV it is always good to try and charge it whilst you are doing something else like shopping, business, or whilst you sleep. You can securely leave the car to charge, because when you lock the car it locks the cable in place also. My car will then notify me through my phone that the charge is completed.

It is important to note at this early stage of EV adoption chargers are not everywhere and you would need to plan where you would shop/charge, but this is changing rapidly. The WA Government has recently released its plan for a new fast-charging network. It will get you from Kununurra to Kalgoorlie and Esperance up and down the coast.

In my opinion, if your trips are mostly less than 600km, the Model 3’s range is practical requiring very few changes to your routine. If your trips are less than 360km, then there would be almost no changes to your routine. It is important to note that EVs will travel further with stop-start, lower-speed travel.

You would expect to get upwards of 450km range in the city with this car, due to regenerative braking, where the electric motor reverses to slow you down and generates power to store in the battery.

I charge at home most of the time, which costs me about $15 giving me just over 350km. This does not include further savings if you have home solar power. At public chargers, you can expect to pay anywhere from $0 to $25. Currently, some places provide free charging as you are spending money in their shop, having a coffee, or grocery shopping for example.

The maintenance on this car is very minimal; tyre rotations and filling windscreen washer fluid are the most frequent maintenance items. Warranty is 4 years for the entire car and 8 years for the drivetrain (electric motor) and battery, with no servicing requirements to keep the warranty.

The batteries are currently lasting well over 250,000km will no major issues and are expected to do over 500,000km. Batteries, after they have lived their first stage in a car, go on to be used for stationary storage, such as household batteries or grid-scale battery storage.

At the end of the life cycle, the battery will be recycled to make new batteries commencing another cycle; over 98% of the battery material can be recycled. The full life cycle of a battery from the beginning to recycling is estimated to be around 50 years.

In writing this blog it has reinforced why I purchased an EV. I like new technology, have become more environmentally conscious over the years, and enjoy powerful cars. If you are interested, I would be happy to show you the car.

This story was originally posted on Rural Oz Electric Car Blog. Reproduced with permission.

Andrew Krupowicz was relieved last month to end the lease on his 2019 Chevrolet Bolt electric car, which had been recalled for the risk of a battery fire. He replaced it with a new, larger Bolt model that wasn’t subject to the safety callback.

“I thought, ‘Great, I’m out of the woods,’” he said. But two weeks later, General Motors Co. expanded its recall to include every Bolt it has built, including his own vehicle. The chartered accountant from Toronto is keeping the car but adding a networked fire alarm in case it catches fire.

GM this month expanded the Bolt safety recall for the second time, calling back the roughly 142,000 models built since it went on sale five years ago. The Detroit auto maker also paused production of all new Bolts. The safety action on its lone U.S. electric car will cost GM an estimated $1.8 billion, or around $12,700 per car, among its costliest recalls.

The safety problems underscore the risks for traditional auto makers as many take a sharp turn toward electric vehicles. The high cost of energy-dense lithium-ion battery cells means replacement expenses can spiral when defects occur. Ford Motor Co. , Hyundai Motor Co. and other car companies have been hit with huge costs to fix relatively small numbers of electric cars.

For GM, the recent troubles come as it tries to convince consumers and investors that it is ready to lead the car industry’s transition to electrics. While the cars have been recalled, GM and battery-cell supplier LG Energy Solution still don’t have a fix.

Hello and welcome back to TechCrunch’s China roundup, a digest of recent events shaping the Chinese tech landscape and what they mean to people in the rest of the world.

The biggest news of the week again comes from Beijing’s ongoing effort to dampen the influence of the country’s tech giants. Regulators are now going after the exploitative use of algorithm-powered user recommendations. We also saw a few major acquisitions this week. Xiaomi is acquiring an autonomous vehicle startup called Deepmotion, and ByteDance is said to be buying virtual reality hardware startup Pico.

Algorithmic regulation

Beijing has unveiled the draft of a sweeping regulation to rein in how tech companies operating in China utilize algorithms, the engine of virtually all lucrative tech businesses today from short videos and news aggregation to ride-hailing, food delivery and e-commerce. My colleague Manish Singh wrote an overview of the policy, and here’s a closer look at the 30-point document proposed by China’s top cyberspace watchdog.

Beijing is clearly wary of how purely machine-recommended content can stray away from values propagated by the Communist Party and even lead to the detriment of national interests. In its mind, algorithms should strictly align with the interest of the nation:

Algorithmic recommendations should uphold mainstream values… and should not be used for endangering national security (Point 6).

Regulators want more transparency on companies’ algorithmic black boxes and are making them accountable for the consequences of their programming codes. For example:

Service providers should be responsible for the security of algorithms, create a system for… the review of published information, algorithmic mechanisms, security oversight… enact and publish relevant rules for algorithmic recommendations (Point 7). 

Service providers… should not create algorithmic models that entice users into addiction, high-value consumption, or other behavior that disrupts public orders (Point 8).

The government is also clamping down on discriminative algorithms and putting some autonomy back in the hands of consumers:

Service providers… should not use illegal or harmful information as user interests to recommend content or create sexist or biased user tags (Point 10).

Service providers should inform users of the logic, purpose, and mechanisms of the algorithms in use (Point 14).

Service providers… should allow users to turn off algorithmic features (Point 15).

The regulators don’t want internet giants to influence public thinking or opinions. Though not laid out in the document, censorship control will no doubt remain in the hands of the authorities.

Service providers should not… use algorithms to censor information, make excessive recommendations, manipulate rankings or search results that lead to preferential treatment and unfair competition, influence online opinions, or shun regulatory oversight (Point 13).

Like many other aspects of the tech business, certain algorithms are to obtain approval from the government. Tech firms must also hand over their algorithms to the police in case of investigations.

Service providers should file with the government if their recommendation algorithms can affect public opinions or mobilize civilians (Point 20).  

Service providers… should keep a record of their recommendation algorithms for at least six months and provide them to law enforcement departments for investigation purposes (Point 23). 

If passed, the law will shake up the fundamental business logic of Chinese tech companies that rely on algorithms to make money. Programmers need to pore over these rules and be able to parse their codes for regulators. The proposed law seems to have even gone beyond the scope of the European Union’s data rules, but how the Chinese one will be enforced remains to be seen.

Lei Jun bets on autonomous cars

In Xiaomi’s latest earnings call, the smartphone maker said it will acquire DeepMotion, a Beijing-based autonomous driving startup, to aid its autonomous driving endeavor. The deal will cost Xiaomi about $77.3 million, and “a lot of that will be in terms of stock” and “a lot of these payments will be deferred until certain milestones are hit,” said Wang Xiang, Xiaomi president on the call.

Xiaomi’s founder Lei Jun earlier hinted at the firm’s plan to enter the crowded space. On July 28, Lei announced on Weibo, China’s Twitter equivalent, that the company is recruiting 500 autonomous driving experts across China.

Automation has become a selling point for China’s new generation of electric vehicle makers, often with companies conflating advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) with Level 4 autonomous driving. Such overstatements in marketing material mislead consumers and make one question the real technical capability of these nascent EV players.

Xiaomi has similarly unveiled plans to manufacture electric cars through a separate car-making subsidiary. The ADAS capabilities brought by DeepMotion are naturally a nice complement to Xiaomi’s future cars. As Wang explained:

We believe that there’s a lot of synergies with [DeepMotion’s ADAS] technology with our EV initiatives. So I think it tells you a couple of points. Number one is, we will roll out EV business. And I said in our prepared remarks, we’ve been very focused on hiring the right team for the EV business at this point in time, formulating our strategy, formulating our product strategy, et cetera, et cetera. But at the same time, we are not afraid to apply it and integrate other teams if we find that those will help us accelerate our plan right.

It’s noteworthy that DeepMotion, founded by Microsoft veterans, specializes in perception technologies and high-precision mapping, which puts it in the vision-driven autonomous driving camp. A number of major Chinese EV makers rely on consumer-grade lidar to automate their cars.

ByteDance goes virtual

ByteDance is said to be buying Beijing-based VR hardware maker Pico for 5 billion yuan ($770 million), according to Chinese VR news site Vrtuoluo. ByteDance could not be immediately reached for comment.

Advanced VR headsets are often expensive due to the cost of high-end processors. Experts observe that most VR hardware makers are yet to enter the mass consumer market. They are hemorrhaging cash and living off generous venture money and corporate deals.

ByteDance might be buying a money-losing business, but Pico, one of the major VR makers in China, provides a fast track for the TikTok parent to enter VR manufacturing. As the world’s largest short video distributor and an aggressive newcomer to video games, ByteDance has no shortage of creative talent. We will see how it works on producing virtual content if the Pico deal goes through.

Battery storage and charger development company Ez4EV has announced that it will launch on-demand mobile electric vehicle charging stations called – ‘EzUrja’ – in the next three months. These will be provided by the company at the locations chosen by the customers. Customers will also be able to locate these mobile stations like they locate mobile ATMs.

‘EzUrja’ mobile charging stations will be deployed in various cities and highways, more so in the smaller towns in order to create better EV connectivity. The charging stations will follow a ‘Charging-on-Demand’ system and are managed as an Internet of Things (IoT) device, allowing for remote condition monitoring and organization of operations. “(Our offering) will mitigate the range anxiety of EV owners and (will) up the missing infrastructure for EV charging points in the country,” Satinder Singh, CEO of the company told PTI. 

(Also read | Odisha approves electric vehicle policy, aims to have 20% EVs by 2025)

The charging stations will come in various sizes with a dedicated power supply having slow and fast charging solution. It will have a logistics management system to handle recharging, using 100 per cent carbon emission-free energy throughput. The mechanism will provide a stabilised flow of energy with zero variables or surges round the clock, and on call.

Ez4EV believes that by creating its mobile charging ecosystem, it will be able to help solve the issue of inadequate charging infrastructure in the country. With this, the company also aims to become a key player in the innovative charging infrastructure market by providing ‘Infra-as-a-Service’ for the Indian EV sector. A fully charged EzUrja charging station will be able to provide a seamless energy supply for the entire range of slow or fast chargers supporting two-wheelers to commercial vehicles to premium EVs.

(Also read | Tata Motors delivers Nexon EV to Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai)

The company says that the lithium-ion manganese phosphate battery chemistry provides the element to make a robust business case, which was not possible with other comparative battery chemistries.

(with inputs from PTI)

Just weeks after Shelter Island was celebrating the purchase of an electric-powered Chevy Bolt for the Building Department, it’s been revealed that the vehicle has a serious flaw requiring rapid replacement of its battery to avoid a dangerous explosion and fire.

Several days ago General Motors issued a recall on all Chevy Bolts, but apparently hasn’t sent notices to purchasers yet.

Building Inspector Reed Karen said he had no knowledge of the recall, and said Senior Building Inspector Chris Tehan was in the car onThursday doing inspections and site visits.

The information on the problem is readily available from General Motors online, but the company’s media relations department hasn’t responded to questions about what efforts are being made to inform owners of the car about the problem.

According to the online notice of the recall, GM will replace the defective lithium ion battery.

Until replacement takes place, GM is advising owners to set their recharge limitation to 90%. The company provides a video of how this should be done, also advising those not comfortable with performing steps necessary to set the lower limit to visit a local dealer to have the adjustment made. The company also advises more frequent charging to avoid depleting the battery below approximately 70 miles of its remaining range.

“Park your vehicle outside immediately after charging and do not leave your vehicle charging indoors overnight,” the advisory said.

A recent CBS report on the situation cited the need to park a Chevy Bolt a distance from any structure because it can explode and result in a fire that will not only destroy the vehicle, but light an adjacent building on fire. The report said fire departments can’t contain the fire in the car, but only stand by until it burns itself out.

What action the Town intends to take is unclear. Supervisor Gerry Siller, informed of the situation on Thursday, hasn’t responded to a request for comment. But since GM hadn’t announced the full recall, it’s possible the partial recall either doesn’t apply to the specific vehicle purchased and the full recall only came in the past week.

The choice of the Bolt was made because the price was competitive and the Town would receive a $7,500 rebate from New York State, Mr. Tehan told the Reporter for a July 29 story. Plans then were to explore the possibility of the Town purchasing a second electric vehicle for the Police Department in line with its efforts to enhance the use of green energy sources.

To save money, the traditional practice has been to hand down older cars, no longer viable for police use, that could serve other departments where vehicle use would be less demanding. Purchasing a new vehicle for the Building Department was unusual.

To ensure authorized that users of State vehicle contracts are able to procure the vehicles that fit their needs, the Office of General Services (OGS) established the Vehicle Marketplace, according to OGS spokesman Joseph Brill. The result is contract users are no longer choosing from a list of available vehicles. Instead, they fill out what is called a mini-bid, either providing specifications for the type of vehicle they want to purchase or requesting a specific vehicle, Mr. Brill said. OGS places the mini-bid on its Vehicle Marketplace and dealers on contract can respond to the request.

This system provides for a greater variety of vehicles and manufacturers from which a buyer can choose, he explained.

The authorized contract user evaluates the mini-bid responses and decides whether or not to purchase the vehicle, he said.

An online search revealed that General Motors first recalled some Chevy Bolts as far back as last November because of fire danger, but didn’t post a full recall of all such vehicles until the past week.

If cars are becoming computers, and computers are essentially appliances, what does that portend for the future of the automotive industry?

Vehicles powered by internal combustion engines (ICEs) are gradually being displaced by electric vehicles (EVs) that are basically computers mated to battery-powered drivetrains.

The technology at work is of course not as simple as that statement implies.

Ask General Motors, whose Chevrolet Bolt EVs are apparently at such risk of randomly bursting into flames that they’ve instructed owners not to park them indoors. And with 11 crashes since early 2018 involving its autonomous driving tech, federal regulators are now questioning whether Tesla is misleading consumers by calling its driver-assistance system “Autopilot.” Obviously, if building the perfect EV was elementary, Bolts wouldn’t be randomly combusting and Teslas would be better at driving in the dark.

But the complexities are being conquered, and much of the basic technology that makes EVs work — batteries, chips, electric motors, sensors — is rapidly becoming both pervasive and generic. Look at how easily competing producers of electric cars have already achieved face-melting acceleration. The instantaneous torque that’s inherent to electric motors means that the whiplash performance you could once upon a time obtain only by shelling out $100,000 will soon be entry-level, the new performance norm. Locomotive excess is being equalized.

Not that many owners of mobility appliances will care.

Once autopilot technology evolves from occasionally trying to kill us to being as capable as the name implies, no one will lift their noses from their smart phones. If that rings of overstatement, think of how many people you see staring at their phones now, when they’re still entirely responsible for not committing vehicular homicide. Once we aren’t required to pay attention while at the wheel, most of the time most of us won’t. Why would you waste the time not doing something else? (Don’t you have a Twitter feed to stay on top of?)

If that’s the brave new world that awaits, how will the auto industry convince us to pay up for these transportation appliances?

The most compelling argument is the most obvious one — we always have.

No one has mastered the dark art of playing on our social insecurities better than the luxury car brands. You’ve seen the commercial, the one with the man/woman slaloming in serene comfort across a bleak desert at closed-course-do-not-attempt-this-at-home speeds. A voiceover confides in a hushed, confident tone:

“You cut your own path,

Because for people like you,

Freedom isn’t a word,

It’s a way of life.”

Yes, Matthew McConaughey could sell an air conditioner to a polar bear.

But still, it’s hard to believe that the effective democratization of bleeding-edge performance won’t result in some price compression. If soon you’ll be able to purchase a comfortable, quiet, extremely fast electric car with excellent range for about $35,000, why would you pay $100,000? (If that price tag seems dubious, the high-performance, long-range version of the P7 electric sedan introduced in China a year ago by Xpeng starts at about $34,000 and goes 0 to 60 in 4.4 seconds. (And many reviewers say it has a much nicer interior than the comparable Tesla.)

The Chinese competition is just getting started. And they’re throwing billions at the effort.

Again, only a fool underestimates the power of marketing (pet rock, anyone?). But one reason that carshare companies have taken off is because many younger people no longer view vehicles as validation or an extension of who they are. They’re just transportation.

If $35,000 will get you a car that accelerates fast enough to induce nausea, is eerily quiet and drives itself, what are the auto manufacturers going to be able to offer you to induce you to spend two or three times that?

It’s an existential question for an industry already being gutted by the unrelenting transition to a more complex but much less complicated future.

The thing is, however technologically advanced, EVs require many fewer parts than comparable ICE-powered transports. While gasoline-powered vehicles typically use about 30,000 components, EVs require about half as many. The entire drivetrain of an electric car employs fewer than 20 moving parts (most electric vehicles don’t have geared transmissions). Optimal performance is elusive, but the battery and motor technology that has made EVs commercially viable continues to advance at an impressive pace.

Unfortunately for the workforce, fewer parts means fewer people.

In Japan alone, the rise of EVs is expected to eliminate 84,000 positions by 2050, more than 10 percent of the 686,000 jobs in auto parts production. Earlier this month, over 2,000 employees of Honda Motor in Japan applied for early retirement as the Japanese automaker restructures its workforce in order to shift production toward more electric vehicles. In Germany they expect at least 215,000 jobs will be affected by 2030 — that’s almost 40 percent of the 613,000 jobs tied to internal combustion engines.

For those employed in the industry, the culling of the workforce is cruelly consistent with the de-mechanization of vehicle design: it takes 10 people to make just the fuel-injection unit for an internal combustion engine, but only one to produce an electric motor.

It’s a fundamental shift that is already sending colossal shockwaves through every corner of the industry, upstream and downstream. Dealers now recognize that the mechanical simplicity and inherent reliability of electric vehicles also means that a key source of their revenue — service and maintenance — is also about to take a massive hit.

That low hum you hear emanating from the EV passing by is the soundtrack to a profound, painful transformation. How strangely quiet it is, the sound of the ICE age entering its twilight…

Steven Grey is CEO and chief investment officer of Grey Value Management LLC in Jupiter.