Earning Reports For The Sharing Community Are Dismal
Lyft, Uber and Airbnb depend on travel, vacations and gatherings - that's a problem when much of the world is staying home.
Even when people return to the office and start travelling, the pandemic could change how they behave for years to come. Thirty percent of gig-economy revenue could disappear over the next one to two years, with a portion of it unlikely to return.
In late April, Lyft laid off 17 percent of its employees. Executives took a 30 per cent pay cut and employee pay was trimmed 10 percent. Use of Uber’s ride service was down 80 per cent in April. Uber laid off 14 per cent of employees. Airbnb laid off 1,900 employees, about 25 percent of its staff and reduced its revenue forecast for this year to half of what it brought in last year.
Read the article at Business Standard.
Electronics Account For 40 Percent Of The Cost Of A New Car
The microprocessors and chips that power modern vehicles are now used in everything from basic trip computers to road-scanning active suspensions.
They've made cars quicker, safer, cleaner, more efficient, and more reliable—better in every way. Computing technology has fundamentally altered the processes of automotive design, engineering, and manufacturing.
And while individual chips may be cheap these days, the computer's significance is evident in just how many there are in a single car. Electronics are responsible for 40 percent of a new car's total cost, according to a Deloitte analysis. That's up from 18 percent in 2000.
Read the article at Car and Driver.
Celebrating Unsung Heroes
As if we don’t have enough worries right now, we do need to be aware of the calamitous threat hackers pose to our fleets. FMW’s interview with Dan Sahar, vice president of product at Upstream Security, about the vulnerability of connected fleet vehicles is an eye-opener.
Call it a hunch, but I bet most fleet managers have been charged with cutting some costs. Where is your biggest bang for saving some bucks? Read You Can Try to Pull a Rabbit Out of Hat for ARI’s “solid, short-term strategic maneuvers.”
Art Liggio reassures us that there is light at the end of the coronavirus tunnel and to that end, offers us “four ways we can encourage positivity and foster productivity to support drivers and the success of the business during these tough times.”
The FMW team applauds Merchant Fleet's Celebrate Fleet week!
Janice Sutton
Editor in Chief
Pickup Trucks Outsell Cars For The First Time, And It May Not Be Temporary
The Ford F-150, Ram 1500, and Chevy Silverado have been the best-selling light vehicles in America for a long time, but for the first time ever, the pickup truck segment as a whole outsold the car segment in the month of April.
The difference was by a large margin, too, with pickups outselling cars by more than 17,000 units. Five years ago, cars outsold trucks by half a million units in a single month, according to Bloomberg.
State restrictions of certain businesses has led to more vehicle deliveries in middle America, where trucks are preferred, than the coastal states. Truck sales especially have been boosted by 0% financing for up to seven years, as well.
Read the article at The Car Connection.
Fuel Prices Suddenly Start Climbing Again As Shelter Orders Start to Lift
When it comes to gas prices, it seems, we already may have hit bottom and could be seeing the numbers start to rise again, just as large portions of the country are set to come out of coronavirus lockdown.
Americans are beginning to spend more time in their cars again, and the trend will accelerate as more states end lockdowns. The latest report from the Energy Information Agency shows that U.S. demand for gasoline rose 800,000 barrels a day last week, to 6.7 million.
While you may find yourself paying a bit more for gas in the coming weeks, there seems little likelihood we’ll soon see the numbers at your local return to pre-pandemic levels any time soon.
Read the article at The Detroit Bureau.
