BMW Group says it has been a pioneer of the circular economy in automotive engineering. It is also at the halfway point success in the Car2Car research project: efficient recycling of steel, aluminium, copper, glass and plastics. For 30 years, the BMW Group’s Recycling and Dismantling Centre (RDC) has been developing and testing processes to achieve significant advances in the recycling of parts and reusable materials. The expertise gained at the RDC is shared with a global network in the recycling industry and helps to promote the establishment of a circular economy in the automotive industry. It also feeds into the BMW Group’s product design process, ensuring that a new model’s recyclability is considered from the outset. Each year, the RDC recycles several thousand vehicles, most of which are pre-series vehicles that have been used for testing and cannot be sold to end customers. These vehicles are dismantled using a standardised process that focuses on identifying reusable series components and materials suitable for recycling.

Infiniti and beyond

Are the toughest of times finally behind Nissan’s luxury brand? Starved of fresh models, at long last things are changing. The ancient, slow-selling Q50 has just been axed – it was the sole remaining car – and the QX80, an XL-sized ladder frame 4×4, is fresh for the US 2025 model year. The big Infiniti replaces a 14 year old and still fairly competitive model with the same name. The new Y63 series Nissan Patrol (North America’s 2025 Armada), is the twin of the 2025 QX80. Same biturbo 3.5-litre V6, but only 317 kW and 700 Nm (425 HP) compared to 336 kW (450 HP) for the Infiniti. In both cases this is more power than the now discontinued 5.6-litre V8 of the old models. Surprisingly, there is neither a hybrid nor a PHEV, never mind an EV option.

Dacia and Renault future

The largest Dacia yet, as well as an electric Clio, are just two of the many forthcoming models discussed in this latest Just Auto report. Assumed to be the most profitable part of Renault Group, Dacia has some of the lowest costs of any Europe based car brand. This, thanks to manufacturing plants in central Europe and North Africa, strong brand loyalty and great value cars. People also like Dacias for their simplicity and low running costs. As the 2020s progress, Renault will accelerate the process of moving almost every Dacia model onto to a single tried and tested platform. CMF-B is many years old and was once a big-volume architecture within the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi-Lada alliance. For Dacia, it is perfect: a great basis for no-nonsense cars and SUVs which can be evolved and updated with minimal expense. The newest CMF-B model is the latest Duster. This 4.34 m long SUV comes with the choice of three powertrains.

Diesel dying

July’s diesel share of new W. Europe passenger car sales is confirmed at 15.0% with August coming in at an estimated 13.9% (and unlikely to change much, if at all), the lowest value seen since the decline set in some years ago. However, the annualised fall was just 1.1 percentage points, among the lowest such comparable in recent times, with August typically being a weaker month for diesel car demand. To date, the region’s diesel share has achieved 14.7%, just 1.9pp below the level seen for the same period in 2023. Volume-wise, the YoY decline in August diesel sales was 30k units with year-to-date sales falling by 130k units. Germany accounted for almost one third of the YoY decline in August with diesel sales 13k units lower than seen in August 2023 although the car market overall was very weak compared with a year earlier and in fact diesel modestly increased its share compared with August 2023. The country’s BEV market was very weak in August with gasoline and gasoline hybrid being the most robust technologies, seeing lower YoY volume decline than diesel and much lower than battery electric vehicles.

Global sales flat

The Global Light Vehicle (LV) selling rate for August stood at 90 million units/year, broadly in line with the previous month. In year-on-year (YoY) terms, market volumes followed the recent trend and were down, at -4% versus August 2023. Year-to-date (YTD) sales remains positive; however, they are now just 1% higher than the same period last year. At the regional level, results in August were mixed. The selling rate in China remained relatively stable this month, with the market expected to gain momentum in the near-term. In the US, volumes were up YoY; however, this result was lower than expected due to a lack of Labor Day deals. Finally, the selling rate in Western Europe improved though the market continues to face challenges with economic and political headwinds — as a result, YTD sales growth in the region has further trended downwards.

Japan lags in China

According to GlobalData, Japanese OEMs don’t appear to be proactive in the NEV transformation. The world’s largest automobile market, China, has undergone tremendous change in the past few years, in particular, the trend towards the New Energy Vehicle (NEV) transformation has been advancing rapidly. Different technical routes from major OEMs have flourished and some Chinese OEMs have seized the opportunity during this transformation wave to overtake foreign brands. China’s domestic NEV sales successfully exceeded a penetration rate of 25% in 2022. In July of this year, they broke the 50% penetration barrier for the first time. Exports have also seen a historic breakthrough in volume terms. In 2023 Chinese OEMs surpassed Japan with exports of more than four million vehicles, becoming the world’s largest automobile exporter. Despite China’s prosperous and fast-developing market, Japanese OEMs have lost ground in China.

India downgraded

The Indian market lost steam in July, with the selling rate dropping to 4.9 million units/year – a 2% decline from a robust June. In absolute figures, Light Vehicle (LV) wholesales reached 389k units, indicating a modest month-on-month (MoM) increase of 1%. However, this number reflects a 3% decline on a year-on-year (YoY) basis. Passenger Vehicle (PV) sales suffered their first contraction since February 2022, with volumes of 335k units marking a YoY decrease of 3%, despite a 1% MoM uptick. In addition, demand for Light Commercial Vehicles (LCVs) with gross vehicle weight of up to 6T fell on a YoY basis for the third consecutive month in July, totaling 54k units. This represents a 1% MoM decrease and an 8% YoY drop. The selling rate also decelerated on a MoM basis for the third successive month. Automakers curtailed deliveries to dealerships in July for models with high levels of unsold inventory. Nevertheless, this was balanced by increased dispatches of newer vehicles with outstanding orders.

OEMs pounce on Tesla

As Tesla sales stagnate in the first half of 2024, other OEMs have taken advantage. The US electrified vehicle market has transformed since the Tesla Model 3 launch in 2017. The explosive growth over the past six years led legacy automakers to invest billions in engineering Electric Vehicles to compete with Tesla’s offerings. Fast forward to today, and compelling models are being launched by the legacy OEMs, supporting the Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV) market while Tesla sales stagnate in the first half of 2024.

W Europe slow

Year-to-date, the Western European market is now up by only 1%. The Western Europe PV selling rate increased 10% month-on-month (MoM) in August, to 12.3 million units/year. However, it must be noted that August is a seasonally weak month for car sales, particularly in the UK, with this market having distorted the regional selling rate upward. In year-on-year (YoY) terms, sales volumes were down 18% though August 2023 was a relatively strong base for comparison as supply was improving and backlogged orders were being fulfilled. Year-to-date (YTD), the Western European market is now up by only 1%, with recent months seeing a downward trend in the YTD evolution. Political and economic issues continue to dampen consumer confidence and the overall outlook of the market in the near-term. It is evident that higher interest rates and vehicle pricing have negatively impacted sales and will continue to do so in the near-term, even if some easing of both takes place. Furthermore, the BEV market continues to struggle, causing industry leaders to call for incentivization to revive sales. We now forecast the full year result to fall just short of the 2023 total.

Situational awareness

Situational awareness when driving is critical for safer and efficient driving. How are AI based sensors assisting with this? LeddarTech develops and provides comprehensive AI-based low-level sensor fusion and perception software solutions to enable the deployment of ADAS, autonomous driving and parking applications. The software developed by the company applies advanced AI and computer vision algorithms to generate accurate 3D models of the environment to achieve better decision making and safer navigation. We spoke with Frantz Saintellemy, CEO, LeddarTech, to learn more about the company and to discuss how the company can assist the auto industry.

Halting hacks

The risk of cyberattacks on automotive OEMs is a rising threat as cars become more tech heavy and connected. As today’s vehicles become ‘smarter’, with the help of onboard technology and network platforms, they become more vulnerable to cyberattacks. What can be done to assist this issue? Leading cybersecurity performance centre, Hack The Box, is a leading gamified cybersecurity upskilling, certification, and talent assessment software platform enabling individuals, businesses, government institutions, and universities to sharpen their offensive and defensive security expertise. The company assist businesses on how to implement effective incident response plans, identify vulnerabilities, create response protocols and much more. We spoke to Haris Pylarinos, founder and CEO at Hack The Box, to learn more about how the company can assist the automotive industry and to highlight the threat of cyber-attacks.

Have a nice weekend.

Graeme Roberts, Deputy Editor, Just Auto

"BMW recycling centre, Infiniti future, diesel dying? – the week" was originally created and published by Just Auto, a GlobalData owned brand.

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