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Friday, December 18, 2009

Electric-car maker Tesla preparing IPO

"Tesla would mark the first public offering from a U.S. automaker since Henry Ford's Ford Motor debuted its shares in 1956."

Congratulations! Finally a digital automaking
beach head on the edge of the world's largest
and farthest reaching businesses while five
billion 5,000,000,000 customers dream of
driving their first cars and trucks!!!

MORE than eight out of 10 humans
Planet Earth still do NOT own
their own cars or trucks!!!

Thursday, December 3, 2009

High Voltage WiFi

There's a story about Tesla helping his friend
who had broken down on the side of the road in
an analgoue or tube electric car long before
computers were invented...

Tesla proceed to tell the friend to hold on
and ran to the hardware store and built a
small device much like a radio black box
and told his friend that he would simply
catch electricity from the air to fix the car.

Within the same day, Tesla had the black box
receiving energy and hooked up his friend's
car who drove away in his wireless electric car.

According to the article below the digital version has arrived!!!

Wireless electricity.

Can we imagine never having to fill up
or charge up our mobile devices including
the next generation of rolling high voltage computers?

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Williams Less Digital F-1 Boost



Williams throws out the battery
for a gyro run by flywheels turning
up to 80,000 RPMs in theory...

How did it perform in the field???

Ferrari's F-1 Digital Racing Tranny (in Italian)



Much More Complex than the Crankshaft Approach
but believe it or not MUCH LESS sophisticated
than Toyota's Secret Hybrid Synergy Drive
that hides 500+ patents in a similar setup...

Mercedes F-1 Digital Racing Development



Mercedes-Benz Delivers the Lightest F-1 Digital Design

Friday, September 25, 2009

White Gold News Links

To celebrate A123 (AONE) better than expected IPO today
which officially starts the race towards White Gold (Lithium)
I'm providing you with some of the better news stories recently:

Orocobre Plans to Start Lithium Output in Argentina (Update1)

The Daily Start-Up: A123 Systems Strikes While Lithium Is Hot

New Material Aims to Make Lithium-ion Batteries Safer


'Saudi Arabia of Lithium' To Produce Batteries By 2016

Western Lithium Looks to Expand Carbonate Production in Nevada

Why Warren Buffet is investing in lithium

Ghosn (CEO of Nissan), Immelt (CEO of GE owner of A123 Lithium battery leader) see future for electric cars as WHEN not IF

Will China Beat the US in the Electric Car Race?

Digital's Analogue Bottleneck

Although I preach and cheer for faster digital development
of automotive technologies, I must admit that the car of
the future cannot become completely run by computers...

Many argue that Lithium is the analogue bottleneck,
or in this case, the big supply & demand question mark?

Some writers think there will never be enough
and others think there's plenty of it worldwide.

What's known for sure, is that the Lithium reserves
on planet Earth are distributed differently than oil.

According to Enough lithium for hybrid boom? Most say yes,
the USA is the most serious about leveraging
Lithium reserves and is getting the most to
market proportionally while Bolivia with the
most reserves in the world.... sits tight...

Locating lithium

Shares of global lithium supply by country
Production Reserves
Chile 39.30% 22.10%
China 13.30 16.20
Australia 11.00 2.40
Russia 10.80 n/a
Argentina 9.80 14.70
United States 8.40 0.60
Bolivia 0.00 39.70

Source: Meridian International Research, 2005 levels
adapted from http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13746_7-10357588-48.html

PS Lithium has tripled in price during The Hybrid Phenomenon!!!

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Analogue vs Digital WRECK



What's the difference between the analogue car that would have killed you
and the digital car that would've saved your life???

Computerized (aka "digital") safety devices!!!

Computers save lives!!!

Analogue Cars and Trucks KILL MILLIONS

Did you know cars and trucks
kill more people each year
than AIDS and other diseases???

Group Warns of Global Road-Death ‘Epidemic’

How many less deaths would there
be if the fleet was digital and
networked like our other devices?

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

VW Digital Hybrid L1

VW Digital E-Up!

Renault Digital ZEC

Audi Digital Concept

Message from Frankfurt: Hydrogen’s Out, EVs Are In; Software Is Key

It's good to see the masses finally keying in on the fact that automaking's destiny is digital. Software is a foreign language written in digital known as 1s and 0s to a computer's Central Processing Unit (CPU or engine) which can't really understand anything other than a digital stream of code more commonly known as software.

Did you know that some modern cars have almost 100 small analogue to digital processing units or mini computers already in them???

Why not go electric and eliminate many of those redundant systems and software to save money, create more jobs to help society on a larger scale???

BMW Complicated Digital Concept

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Shockgun Weddings

Here's a digital ten billion dollar list of
shotgun weddings that will change the
world's largest business forever!!!

Compact Power, Inc. (LG Chem, Ltd.) received $151,400,000 of your tax dollars to produce the lithium-ion polymer battery cells for the Chevy's Volt for GM who will invest $240,000,000 of your tax dollars into batteries
Bosch (BOM) and BMW
Ener1 (HEV) got $118,500,000 of your tax dollars to build batteries for Nissan (NSANY)
Daimler and Tesla Motors
Johnson Controls (JCL) and Ford (F) got $100,000,000 for batteries
GE and A123 who landed $249,100,000 for battery packs and systems preferred by many EV race car drivers
Buffet and BYD
Valence and Segway
Panasonic EV Energy and Toyota (TM)
Sanyo and Ford
Saft and Mercedes

Sunday, July 26, 2009

Lightning in the Wheels

Tesla let the electric genie out of the bottle
and England/Wales just put Lightning IN THE WHEELS
unleashing 700 digital horsepower wrapped in 007 like lines!!!

This is the beginning of computers quickly invading
the wheels after only a few years of
disrupting drive trains with Lithium...

Add GPS and networking to a digital all wheel drive
and you've got an automobile that should be able
to beat anything with four wheels in theory!!!

Thank you Lightning for upgrading Porsche's in wheel electric concept
that powered his world's first 100+ year old hybrid
to many land speed records and racing wins!!!

It's about time we reinvented all four wheels :)

Thursday, May 28, 2009

The Big Digital 3

with the pending GM bankruptcy as well as Chrysler
and dozens of companies in the 1,000 family of
operational businesses that those giants run
face a new digital dawn it might be time to
predict the new Big D3...

in other words the top 3 companies in terms
of digital units produced...

what is a digital unit??? a car or truck that
incorporates computers in it's drive train which
is the parts from the engine to the wheels...

most hybrids quality, all electrics, all plug-ins,
all fuel-cell vehicles qualify as digital so long
as there's computers saving you energy in the drive train
delivery you more control and performance or efficiency only:

many argues that Toyota is #1 but #2 and #3 are for the taking
and many analysts are saying that Honda is the only company
that will turn a profit this year and by making 20 million
engines with only a few hybrids and fuel-cell vehicles
could this group of 500 companies become #2???

if so, you may want to read our team's report on the multinational
which could be summarized as Japan's black sheep of automaking going global:

Group Project Report: Honda Motor Co., Ltd.
By:
John Acheson
Judy Padilla
Darryl Smith

Instructor:
Michelle Dominguez, MBA
Business 280B
May 10, 2009


Table of Contents


1.0 Introduction ………………………………..…………………………………………………………3
2.0 Business Structure …….…………………………………………………………………………….4
3.0 Overview of Multinational Operation..……………………..………………………………….5
4.0 Legal Environment …………………………………………………………….…………………….7
5.0 Advantages and Disadvantages of Operating Abroad ……………….…………………8
6.0 Recommendations / Conclusions ……………………………………………………………….9
7.0 Bibliography / Works Cited ……………………………………………………………………….11






















1.0 Introduction

Honda is headquartered is in Japan and the founder of the company is Mr. Soichiro Honda (1906-1991). He had no formal education and was an apprentice car mechanic at a garage from 1922 until 1928. His father was a blacksmith and his mother a weaver.

At the age of 17 he was the mechanic for car racer Shinichi Sakibahara, who won the Chairman’s trophy at Tsurumi. Mr. Honda started his own auto repair business (Art Shokai) at the age of 22 in 1928. In October of 1946 Honda Technical Research Institute was established and the first product was launched--an auxiliary engine that had been used to power radios for use in powering a bicycle. Subsequently, Honda Motor Co. Ltd. was established on September 24, 1948 and was led and expanded into a multinational by President and CEO, Mr. Tadeo Fukui.

Mr. Honda’s first focus was on building small capacity motorcycle and developed the Super Cub which was similar to a modern moped. Honda stumbled upon a cheap yet valuable vehicle for societies looking for affordable and flexible mobility. Before he knew it, his Super Cub was being exported all over the world, and America was a natural place for the larger bikes and engines Honda moved up to.

Honda's business partner Fujisawa made the call to start with America arguing that if Honda could make it in America, it could make it anywhere. Even though he knew that it would be easier to start with Southeast Asia, which still relies on more motorcycles than cars today, Honda's business head chose America and in 1959 setup a sales office in Southern California with eight employees. This small office was the beginning of Honda’s international business that went on to become a global multinational powerhouse.

By 1960 Honda was an international business. Honda kept tinkering for years working on engines to become a piston ring expert: his mastery of engines started early and was called the “Japanese Henry Ford”. Today Honda produces more engines than any other company, in some years over 20 million units. Most recently, Honda started making airplane engines. As of March 31, 2008 Honda has 178,960 (consolidated) employees and 501 subsidiaries. Its chief products are motorcycle, automobiles, power products, and of course engines. Their main competitors are primarily in the automobile industry (Nissan, Toyota, Ford Motor Co., and General Motors). Services offered by Honda includes: financing, customer service, satisfaction and sales, research & development, and racing.
2.0 Business Structure

Honda’s mission statement is, “Maintaining a global viewpoint, we are dedicated to supplying products of the highest quality, yet at reasonable price for worldwide customer satisfaction.”
Their basic principle is respect for individuals and the three joys (buying, selling and creating). On Honda’s website this statement is listed that would best describe their business philosophy: “Dreams inspire us to create innovative products that enhance mobility and benefit society. To meet the particular needs of customers in different regions around the world, we base our sales networks, research and development centers and manufacturing facilities in each region. Furthermore, as a socially responsible corporate citizen, we strive to address important environmental and safety issues.”

Honda Business Structure (www.honda.com/profine/organization/)

On April 28, 2008 Honda commemorated its milestone of a 5 millionth vehicle made in Canada since starting manufacturing vehicles in the country 23 years ago. During this downward economy, Honda has been experiencing worldwide decrease in production since November of 2008 (first time in five years), although production in Asia and China set al-time fiscal records. Honda Fit was the best selling car among new vehicle registration for March 2009. During their press release last month, Honda announced that their consolidated net sales and operating revenue reflected a 41.6% decrease compared to last fiscal year. Projection of return profits to shareholders for 2009’s first two quarters is 22%, 11% for the third quarter and 0% for the fourth quarter.

Honda takes its corporate responsibility very seriously and their key phrase is “Together for Tomorrow” which captures the spirit of Honda. http://world.honda.com/community/
A few of their initiatives are educational, environmental, traffic safety and community, are dedicated to worldwide philanthropic activities. Honda has started a new venture with GS Yuasa in the creating Blue Energy Co., LTD, a company designed for manufacturing, sales, research and development of lithium-ion batteries for hybrid vehicles. Construction started April 2009 and is scheduled to begin production around Fall of 2010. This is part or their commitment to a safer and cleaner environment through exhaust emission reduction and the development of alternative fuels to help ensure harmonious coexistence with host communities. Honda FCX Clarity [hydrogen fuel cell] was named 2009 World Green Car and Honda was recognized for their commitment to environmental leadership. Another of their environmentally friendly cars is the Civic Hybrid. On Earth Day, April 22, 2009, Honda launched its second generation 2010 Honda Insight hybrid electric vehicle (40mpg under $20,000) along with the lightweight CR-Z sports hybrid concept vehicle.
3.0 Overview of Multinational Operations

Honda, the company, is actually a group of hundreds of companies, so it's difficult to understand the day-to-day operations, without understanding the structures of the different companies across national borders. For example, there are several American Honda Companies that may or may not send products outside of North American borders. This is quite different from other companies that mainly import into America. BMW, Mercedes, and most luxury brands don't have factories in America so they primarily build overseas and import to America.

Honda is very different—in fact, it decided from day one, that it would setup in America, and keep the money made in America, to create more jobs by building more products and factories. Taking a look at Honda's global website at http://world.honda.com/ visitors are immediately blasted with everything but cars, including medical walking devices, flower accepting robots and even brain machine interface technology. So the best way to think about Honda's America's multinational parent Honda Motor Company, Ltd. (Honda Japan) is kind of like a General Electric (GE). GE runs everything from banks to airplane engines to nuclear power plants.

Management Organization of Honda’s Corporate Governance for Decision Making, Execution, Supervision and Others. http://world.honda.com/profile/governance/zoom.html


Honda R&D Americas works ideas into patents, and dozens more including financials like American Honda Finance Corp. and American Honda Receivables Corp. American Honda Finance Corporation dba Honda Financial Services helps customers looking to lease or buy. It represents the financial strength of the brand to Wall St. It operates smaller Honda banks like the one in Canada that loans people money to buy Honda products or the company that leases products. Honda vehicles rank near the top of assets that hold value so Honda's banking operations are strong. American Honda Receivables Corp. works with banks like U.S. Bank, Barclays, Deutsche Bank to turn all those loans that customers owe them for vehicles and other products into big money on Wall St. It's the American part of the Honda Bank described above.

Honda joined 70 of the biggest global multinationals headquartered in Tokyo; so we can assume taxes are low. Honda's tax strategy is much deeper and much more local than a company like Mercedes or VW that simply imports into American and exports our cash without paying all those local taxes from payroll, to the electric bill, to disability or worker's compensation. For example, Honda in Torrance, CA sells Honda cars to dealers in Las Vegas. Those dealers are not Honda—they are exclusive customers of Honda so they pay all the taxes in Nevada. But Honda of Torrance pays gasoline taxes on the trucks, transportation taxes and fuels, taxes on the income and sales, and of course anything related to employees both for the sales and transportation part of it. This doesn't include all the companies from idea to factory to Honda in Torrance. Honda’s American bank manages the money for Honda America whereas other companies send the money back overseas. There is a central bank in both countries to assist with international activities such as obtaining funding. Japan’s central bank has the second largest foreign exchange reserves after China.
4.0 Legal Environment
Honda has a compliance and risk management system. This was established so that each Honda organization, under the lead of the director in charge, can deal with legal compliance issues and risk management in a systematic manner while enabling verification of such situations on a regular basis. The Risk Management Officer oversees the risk management department and the Compliance Officer is responsible for the enforcement of legal compliance. There is also a Business Ethics Committee which is responsible for the deliberation of matters of corporate ethics and legal compliance. Honda has also established an Ethics Proposal Line for suggestions concerning corporate ethics and serve as a link to actual execution of improvements
Their government’s economic liability is the third largest public debt of any nation and this information can be obtained in the World Fact Book under public debt. Zimbabwe has the highest public debt. Japan ended its period of economic expansion in October 2007 and entered a recessionary period in 2008. In 2009 the return on interest rates are near 0%. The economy of Japan had been very solid and was considered the second largest economy in the world after the United States. The current worldwide economic crisis has impacted all nations, including Japan. Japanese workers are highly educated and Japan also has a high level of savings and investment rate. They are highly dependent on imported energy and approximately fifty percent of energy in Japan is from petroleum, one fifth from coal and fourteen percent from natural gas. Japan’s dependency on imported energy has projected Japan’s goal towards fuel economy and more diversification in its sources.

Honda is presently a member of The International Association of Traffic and Safety Sciences; it is also a member of the United Nations (1956), World Trade Organizations (1995), and The World Health Organization.

5.0 Advantages and Disadvantages of Operating Abroad

Honda was the first foreign auto maker to setup foreign operations in the U.S. and is believed to be the first to open factories in the U.S. They also structured the U.S. Honda to keep all of its profits in the U.S. to continue to invest, hire American workers and expand operations. In fact, Honda sales have been dropping in Japan for decades as the company relies more and more on foreign operations.
For the first quarter of 2009, Honda was the only automaker to turn a profit out of the Top 10 including Toyota, VW, GM, Ford, etc. They don't sell the most vehicles but have always made the most profit consistently, kept the money local, and invest more into R&D. For example, Honda has significant research facilities in the US while other companies have smaller or none.
Honda is one of the most diverse automakers because expertise in engine manufacturing took them into many industries! In addition to vehicles of all kinds, the lawnmower, airplanes, cars, trucks, power generators, robots, etc.; and you can find Honda in almost every situation used by almost any nationality or minority. The only area Honda lacks diversity would be in the Japanese companies and especially management. Abroad, Honda has expanded their customer service initiative, enhanced their approach of cooperative ventures with suppliers, ensures diversity in employment, encourages development in staff abilities, builds healthy working environments and enforces occupational health and safety.
Without starting its operations abroad, Honda would have never gone from a small Japanese company to a global international multinational powerhouse of 500 companies operating all over the world making more engines and moving machines that any other company!
6.0 Recommendations/Conclusion

Honda’s advantages definitely outweigh its few disadvantages. Since Honda took globalization seriously from the beginning, they have the ability to be the most flexible multinational in auto making. With local operations in each region, they are the best automaker at adjusting the amount of production. Exporters relying on a few factories cannot change things as quickly as Honda. So in the economic downturn, Honda was able to react faster and more local than all the other automakers. Therefore, Honda is more innovative and profitable than competitors, while delivery quality and value!

The price that Honda has paid is its reputation in a highly educated Japan. Without any formal education, Honda was an outcast and never taken seriously by Japan’s elite and upper class businessmen. Many customers in Japan prefer Toyota, Suzuki, Nissan, Mitsubishi and other brands over Honda. Honda was kind of the black sheep car company in Japan and after World War II; engineers would apply to Nissan and Toyota and if they didn’t get hired they would chose Honda as a last resort. Although things changed by the 80s, Honda has always had to fight for respect in Japan coming from an uneducated blue collar background. The disadvantage has led to a long decline in Japanese market share while the company grew abroad.

So in weighing the advantage of being one of the top global brands and multinationals in the world vs. a declining Japanese presence, it’s pretty obvious that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages because our modern world is becoming more and more global.

Honda’s mission is definitely global with a focus on providing quality to benefit societies around the world while saving customers money. To do so Honda sets up sales, R&D and factories in each region to provide goods and services locally. That’s much different than competitors who produce in one country and export to others. Honda seems to care more about adapting to foreign places and serving diverse customers than other Japanese companies. In fact, not only is Honda the first automaker to setup in America and build a factory, it’s really the only Japanese multinational that operates independently abroad and keeps those earnings in house to invest in each region. The result is that Honda’s benefit to society is more than just products. It’s a way of life providing jobs to Americans for example and reinvesting into each local community.

Clearly, Honda could NOT achieve its mission and goals if it stays in Japan and exports. It may have worked with the simple moped motorcycles, but starting with cars and other complicated products, customer tastes, regulations, rules, and of course costs would prohibit success. It might be possible for Honda to deliver quality from Japan, but they would not be able to achieve their philosophical goals and societal benefits including reasonable prices to customers without having setup in each region. Honda is really the only Japanese automaker that has let go of the importance of its home country’s sales to focus on worldwide success. Interestingly, it was Toyota that followed Honda to American with factories and products like hybrids. Since Honda’s disadvantage is its reputation and declining presence in Japan, the company could improve by investing more at home.

Therefore, some avenues might be an acquisition, such as taking a large position in an automaker like Mazda, or even buying another company outright. A good example might be buying a supplier like Sanyo, which is the world leader in batteries used for mobility. Honda could leverage this technology into its various operations around the world as a steady supply of batteries for products from robots to medical devices to hybrid vehicles—a good way for Honda to add Sanyo’s integrity, history and reputation to help Honda’s presence in Japan.







7.0 Bibliography

Honda Worldwide. 2009. Honda Motor Co., LTD. 4 May 2009 http://world.honda.com/about/

Honda. 2009. Wikipedia. Web.4 May 2009. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda#Background

Honda. 2009. Wikipedia. Web.4 May 2009.
Honda Worldwide. 2009. Honda Motor Co., LTD. 4 May 2009 http://world.honda.com/profile/globaloperations/>.

Honda Worldwide. 2009. Honda Motor Co., LTD. 4 May 2009 http://world.honda.com/news/2003/c030421.html

CIA - The World Fact Book. 04232009. Japan. 4 May 2009 https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ja.html#Govt.

Phelps, Mark. "HondaJet Facing Delays; Deliveries Expected by Year End 2011." Article 433 of 444, Web.8 May 2009. http://www.flyingmag.com/news/1512/hondajet-facing-delays-deliveries-expected-by-year-end-2011.html

Sato, Masaaki. The Honda Myth: The Genius and His Wake. First American Edition. Random House, 2006. Print. (Sato 1-480)

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Investing in Digital Automaking

How can one invest in the future of the automobile
after over one hundred years of analogue development
during this cusp of a massive industry wide transition
to digital technologies from clean diesel to electrics???

Daimler just gave you the chance by swallowing 10% of Tesla.

As most digital automakers like Telsa are privately traded
you cannot buy their stock on the public markets so since
Daimler is publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange
and owns 10% of Tesla as of the same day MPG and greenhouse
gas emissions standards started the American digital automaking
race you can research and invest in Daimler to place bets on
clean diesel luxury automaking along with Tesla power trains.

Investing $50M for almost 10% of Tesla roughly values
the leading electric sports car maker almost at half
a billion dollar company after only delivering
a hundred or two roadsters to customers, WOW!!!

Here's some helpful links for you:
NYSE: DAI on Google Finance or Yahoo Finance

Monday, May 18, 2009

Driving Digital's New Dawn

The digital development of automaking will see a new dawn tomorrow
driven by new laws that deem dirty to average cars illegal!

"This is the single biggest step the American government has ever taken..."

What's the number one factor and
number one consumer benefit that
is driving digital automaking?

Many studies and most of the research over the past decade
shows that higher gas prices cause digital cars and trucks
to accelerate in sales as buyers seeks higher MPGs.

Starting tomorrow, the USA MPG bar will move significantly
higher than ever before in American history as
California's green digital screams turn into new laws
on capitol hill; the highest MPG state laws are being
studied to establish a new federal wide standard that
will force digital automaking unto all players
that want to continue to enjoy the most important
car and truck markets in the world.

CA and CAFE's millennial son could become the biggest
stick in the history of digital automaking and I'm
going to place my bets by buying Honda Motor Co., Ltd.
common stock traded on the American markets because
this digital automaker has the highest
mileage fleet being bought in the USA.

These companies also hire tens of thousands of American
workers that are working to make cars and trucks cleaner
so that our precious oil used for everything from shipping
everything you buy at every store to your toothpaste tube
to every toy to your entertainment center and computer
can last longer and we don't have to burn up the rest
running errands and waiting at stoplights.

Remember that all digital vehicles have the ability
to stop burning oil at stoplights and stop signs!!!

INVESTMENT ANALYSIS
Based on the assumption that a new race to 42 MPG
for automaker fleetwide average will take off tomorrow
the following analysis is based on Greenopia's MPG ratings
of 42 automakers from Ferrari at 12 MPG to Smart at 36 MPG
allthough the list does not include brands such as Tesla
that earn well over 100 MPG in gallon of gasoline equivalent
which doesn't matter anyway in terms of investment since we
cannot buy public stock in them. Also note that companies like
MINI or Smart are also not available as stand alone investments,
so the trick is to find the automaker that has the best MPG
AND has enough volume on a stock market to enjoy appreciation.

25 MPG BRANDS: there's only six brands
(Smart, Mini, Scion, Honda, Saturn, Toyota)
that get over 25 MPG and of those
only two are automakers (Honda and Toyota)
as Smart is Daimler, Mini is BMW (20.5) and Scion is Toyota.

How many brands at the bottom of the list are in bankruptcy?
Hummer (15.5 MPG), Cadillac (17.6), GMC (17.8), Jeep (19.1), Dodge (19.2)
and interestingly, none of these brands have launched a successful digital.

In summary, I have decided to buy shares of HMC (Honda Motor Co., Ltd.)
at market open price based on anticipation of the new federal digital race
towards 42 MPG and hope that my investment in the 500 companies that Honda
runs continue to provide us with benefits, utility and future value!!!

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Digital Delivery

Why burn up all Earth's liquid fuels
waiting at stoplights or running errands?

After all, almost everything you buy or rent
at probably every store or business you shop at
may have been transported by a truck...



Why not save our oil for transportation???

Monday, April 20, 2009

Fill erv Up with Digital Fuel

Why does the last few meters of the World Wide Web
still run over analogue copper wires???

Could it be that a ubiquitous or commonly adopted standard
is just too embedded into society to change that quickly...

The European digital automaking world would disagree
in terms of the future of filling up on digital fuel.

Rather quickly and quietly, they have standardized
the future gas station as 3 prongs filling 400 volts.

That's kind of like gas station decades ago
deciding on the same size nozzle and octane.

For all you digital automaking enthusiasts out there,
start your 400V motors, controllers and transformers.

All those proprietary designs that R&D has spent billions on
over the past few decades will probably be replaced by a few
common ubiquitous simple yet heavy duty versions of the household plug.

Think twice before you install a special charger at home
like the ones designed for the EV-1, RAV4-EV, Honda EV, Think or Tesla.

Or who knows, maybe we'll see an alphabet soup of adapters,
cords, transformers and converters at the local Radio Shack
so you can plug in your collectible early model digital car
into the new standard just announced???

Here's the relative news links:
Agreement reached on common plug for electric cars
BERLIN (AFP) — Leading automotive and energy companies have reached agreement on a common "plug" to recharge electric cars, a spokeswoman for German energy ...

Car Companies Standardize Plug for Electric Vehicles
Caroline Reichert, a spokeswoman for the Germany energy company RWE, said leading automotive and energy companies have reached an agreement for a ...

E-car industry agrees on one plug to rule them all
Berlin - Electric car makers and power companies are to unveil this week a standard Europe-wide power plug to recharge the batteries of electric vehicles, ...

Friday, April 10, 2009

Digital Tires

I went out to the truck the other day, and it looked pretty low on one side...

The front left tire was flat so I changed the tire and checked the odometer...

The Original Equipment (OE) tires were beyond their life at over
70,000 miles which meant that I drove very carefully and
constantly exceeded the EPA MPG rating...

Even though I didn't have the digital version of the vehicle.
In the gasoline Ranger rated at around 20 MPG avg,
I've been able to get 24 MPG around town and up to 38 MPG on the highway
which is almost doubling mileage or 40% OFF your $1,000 to $5,000 gas bill/yr.

For a higher mileage car,
doubling mileage would mean going from 30 to 60 MPG
or 40 to 80 MPG or even 50 to 100 MPG for advanced users.

In my last digital car with the tires pumped up on the highway behind a semi truck
it was easy to get mileage over 100 MPG for a few minutes at a time by lowering
resistance, both air and tire.

So let's take a look at digital tiremaking:

Some studies show tires eating up to 20% of your fuel energy!

One of the most expensive solutions is reported as Michelin's $43,000,000+
investment into the "Energy Saver" series of tire release in Europe
that for some unknown reason is being dumbed down as "Primacy" for the USA.

So here's a list of tires on digital vehicles installed by manufacturers
on to stock digital vehicles that were developed with mileage in mind.

"Bridgestones" - Toyota RAV-4 EV
Bridgestone Potenza - Honda Insight Hybrid USA
Continental ContiTrac EcoPlus - Ford Escape Hybrid USA
Dunlop SP31A - 2010 Honda Insight Revenge
Goodyear FuelMax (an extra mile) - 2011 Chevrolet Volt
Michelin Energy LX4 - 2007 Toyota Highlander Hybrid
Michelin Energy Saver - Toyota Prius EURO
Michelin HXV4 - Toyota Prius USA
Michelin MXV4 (215/60R 16 95H)- Honda FCX
Michelin Pilot HX MXM4 (215/45R17 87V) - 2010 Prius Hybrid USA
Michelin Proxima RR (175/65R14, self-sealing tires, tire pressure warning indicator) - Saturn EV-1
Yokohama ADVAN A10F (160/A/A) - Lexus GS450h
Yokohama ADVAN Neova - 2006 Tesla Roadster
Yokohama AVS E100 Radial (195/80R16 at 44 psi) - 1996 Toyota RAV-4 EV
Yokohama E105 (205/60R15 91H) - 2004-2007 Honda FCX Fuel Cell Vehicle


This list is a work in progress as OEM tire research
is much more difficult than expected.

Sunday, April 5, 2009

Up to 106MPG for less???

3 Digital Cars Cost $2,600,000,000???

Going green is great but why is saving our oil so expensive?

Why do automakers claim it cost $1,000,000,000
to put digital vehicles into showrooms???

Is it the R&D, testing, regulation, insurance, etc?

Or is it overkill before getting to the showroom?

The first mainstream digital vehicle hit American roads
over 10 years ago but consumers didn't buy enough 70MPG...

Honda discontinued the digital Insight after several hundred million and five years of efforts. Toyota spent over a billion on the Prius and lost money for years until the technology went through generations of cost reductions. GM spent a billion on their infamous EV-1 and another billion on The Hybrid Development Center that led to hybrids like the Escalade.

In the heat of the Great Recession,
after borrowing over $15,000,000,000
from American tax payers,
GM has requested more money!!!

This time around, GM, the automaker born from Ford's 2nd business,
asked American tax payers to lend another $2,600,000,000
so that
Chevrolet could develop three version of the infamous Volt
that should get 100+ MPG.

Do you think a billion per new vehicle
is a feasible business model for the
new era of digital automaking???

Would you loan a digital automaker
$1,000,000,000
to develop a digtal automobile?

Based on the industry standard of
a few thousand in profits per vehicle
how many of those digital widgets
would your investee have to sell
to pay salaries run the factories
and pay you back?

There has to be a cheaper way
to get a digital vehicle on the road...

Ford's Digital Double Down

Following Honda's Insight Digital Revenge and Prius Fighter,
Ford has announced some big digital numbers to look forward to:

170MPG!!!

Did you know that the Digital Insight and Prius
were rated in Japan at about 94MPG over 10 years ago???

So why are we driving cars and trucks in the 20MPG range???

Do you remember your first computer???

How much did it cost and how fast was the engine???

My first laptop cost over $3K with a Pentium 2 only 10 years ago
and today you can buy a faster better and bigger laptop for 1/5 the price.

So every few years we should expect either
1) twice as much mileage
or
2) half the price

So why have cars been going the wrong way???

Ford's Model T on a good day got over 30MPG,
what do you get today in your analogue car???

I'm guessing you paid 5 times Ford's game changer
AND you get LESS mileage...

Ford's Digital Double Down may finally change the
analogue game to digital because once we take
100MPG for granted we can start talking about
making oil last 200 years or more instead of
the century that is currently projected.

Unless we start taking numbers like Ford's 170MPG
we will burn up the rest of our oil in a short century.

Do you want to leave any oil for your great grand children???

Oil to make jet fuel and diesel
that delivers everything
you use and consume
from food to household items to clothes
to almost anything in every store...

Or should we burn it all up running errands and waiting at stoplights???

Even 170MPG won't leave enough for 7 generations
so write a letter and encourage digital automaking innovation
like Ford's bold step to leap frog the inevitable 100MPG goal line :)

Tuesday, March 10, 2009

Digital Insight & Revenge

http://world.honda.com/Geneva2009/INSIGHT/video02/

Honda on the other hand, has Thought long and hard
about the most innovative digital release in automaking history,
that was unfortunately, followed by a gigantic business loss,
joining the EV-1, RAV-4 EV and Honda EV in terms of profits,
BUT the Honda engineers employed kaizen or continuous improvement
and will be releasing the Insight Revenge on Earth Day.

The 1st Generation Insight still holds the American Record for MPG at 70 miles per gallon for a mass-production vehicle, but in reality it was hand-built by Honda's best engineers and probably sold for half the build costs including all the engineering. Even so, only a few thousand of the world's best marathoner sold for the few short years that the Insight invited the Prius over from Japan to change automaking forever. The Insight project was shut down just like GM's EV-1, Toyota's Rav-4 EV and Honda's EV because the Insight business was bleeding to much.

The 2nd Generation Insight (5 minute video avail at link above) will release to America on Earth day and has pre-sold out around the world. Initial production was targeted at 10x the 1st Generation Insight and if Honda sells over 100,000 of these digital Prius fighers, I would have to declare digital automaking beyond the start-up phase.

Think Digital Revenge



Most digital automaking smaller busineses have gone through ownership changes and some have even survived extinction with emotional and political cries saving these treasures from terrible fates like America's most infamous car faced in the crushing of most all of GM's EV-1s.

Think's electric cars actually made it onto American roads and you can still see the first generation digital golf carts running around many college campuses in the West, manufactured during a time when Big 3 Brother Ford bought Think out too early for today's digital revolution.

Apparently, things went South during the Hummer and Explorer era, at which time an idea surfaced to crush, destroy and kill the Think brand... The public reacted fast, furious and in big enough numbers to save the brand, have the prisoners of trade war sent back to Norway, and a local grassroots rebirth sprouted back here in this video on the world stage.

It's great to see one survivor of the first generation of digital vehicles: GM's EV-1 managed by Saturn, Toyota's RAV-4 EV and Honda's EV flanked by Think and other smaller startups like GEM. EV-1s are worth a million if you can find them stock, RAV-4 EV's go for double original price on eBay used when and if the few celebrities and lucky consumers let them go and the Honda EV is like a unicorn, we've heard of it and seen pictures, but have never actually watched one drive on a public road.

Think of the other hand, has come back for revenge, and is still an edangered yet protected species. We can thank educational leaders and futurists for saving the few American Thinks still helping college workers provide American kids cleaner universities.

Saturday, March 7, 2009

Mercedes Better Late than Never Digital


For those of you into digital engineering, Daimler, who popularized the analogue explosion engine argues that the battery might be the trick. The interesting about digital automaking is that the first generation energy storage devices like this so-called "advanced" battery are still analogue. Do you think analogue storage devices like nickel or Lithium batteries or even flywheels will be enough to engineer the digital devices that will power the next centuries and millenia? I personally think that we're just at the beginning and may see tremendous advancement in energy storage as digital automaking takes off. Daimler started analogue automaking and better late than never going digital...

Hyundai Steps up to the Digital Plate


It's hard to imagine that the Korean automakers only started a few decades ago and have achieved significant penetration into the Western American market. They've proven that affordability can propel a brand into a large stage. Is the HED a precursor for the low-cost strategy that only one automaker will employ in the analogue to digital conversion? According to Michael Porter, only one firm can succeed in producing products at a lower cost than others. The best example is Wal-Mart vs. bankrupt K-Mart. One focused on low prices and the other focused on moving a pallet of anything anywhere in the world cheaper than any other company on the planet. Who will be able to automake digital at the lowest cost? Probably not the automakers in your garage... Could this design go digital and affordable?

Affordable Simple Sexy Digital


Everyone is coming to the digital party including suppliers who are creating vehicles to showcase Intellectual Property that has been marinating in back office garages for decades! It's about time someone sees that automaking will follow the same path as consumer electronics and computers. A few companies make the chassis and a few more design the package sold by a few more brands. Would you rather make the guts, motors or shell? Magna is offering to let your digital automaker focus on design and branding. Just like opening a Dell, Gateway, HP or Sony laptop and finding only one of two engines and almost identical chassis in several brands. Where did Acer and Asus come from? Maybe the same place Magna is proposing...

Nissan's Old School Analogue New School Digital Marraige


Nissan shows one way to get to digital! WOW! Marry old school analogue diesel explosions to the next generation of smooth motors for a ride that can go forever... Diesels don't break and electric motors have two moving parts so expect this Infiniti to live up to it's name when a derivative shows up at your dealership next decade...

Edmunds Introduces Mistubishi's Digital Experiment


Mitsubishi has quietly been digital automaking for decades and the iMev has the best shot at coming to a digital dealership to your next decade!!!

California Digital Geneva Debut


Headquartered in California Fisker Shows it's Digital Flagship The Karma

Monday, March 2, 2009

GM's Digital Flagship Gets European Makeover






The same leader is developing the Chevy Volt and Opel Ampera as GM's Flagship to lead the digital automotive revolution in power-train technology. These amazing and complicated cars are expensive. GM's 1st Digital Bet on the EV-1 cost an estimated billion ($1,000,000,000.00) or more to develop and the Volt doesn't look that far behind with the Ampera makeover costs. How many cars will we have to buy to help GM break even on this digital double-down?

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Who Wants to Borrow $25,000,000,000 of Your Digital Tax Dollars???




$25 Billion to Promote Electric Cars Is Untouched

The electric car battery war

Tesla CEO: Federal loan for electric-car plant could come soon

BusinessWeek ponders lithium ion market war

Loan sought for electric cars by Nissan

Peugeot Puts Analogue and Digital Together


Start Your Analogue Engines and Digital Motors!!!

Digital NOS in Spanish


FREE fueled NOS braking NOT included :)

BMW's PhD Perspective on Digital F1


F1 Finally Goes Digital!!!

Kinetic Digital Flybrid Boost

75% OFF Digital Hybrids 1/2 Half in Weight!!!


Lithium-ion finally gets a startup rival
which basically boils down the digital
fuel race down to chemical vs mechanical powered digital powertrains!!!

Ferrari Finally Goes Digital


Congratulations to Ferrari!!!
I've been wondering when you were going to go digital
and the wait was worth it!!! Flywheels are sexy enough to battle horsepower with Kilojewels!!! It's great to see a world-class powerhouse accelerate the digital race!!!

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

California Digital Dreams


Designed in California Customized in Silicon Valley

World's Most Expensive Digital Car Made in USA


If you can find one of these consider it the rarest and potentially most valuable digital car ever made. Very few were manufactured and most of them were crushed. I'm guessing a valuation of an easy $1M in decent shape today and $5-10M when digital automobiles become the majority.

Tesla hires Detroit for Designed in USA


Tesla led the way opening the door for digital domination but soon realized that industry expertise is key during the growth stage. Are digital automobiles finally out of the garage? If so, will the Western United States (which designs the majority of future automobiles) continue sucking auto industry talent from Detroit, the UK and other places? If so, California, Oregon, Nevada may set the new digital curve in automaking!

California beats Detroit


tZero Jumpstarts Western Digital Automaking History (Tesla's DNA is BORN)

Quickest in the West


Oregon is quietly racing out front of the digital pack. Just take a look at the list of Auto X Prize teams and the long electric drag racing history. Could the state that does more trade in used automobiles than any in America be the darkhouse in the digital race? I think so. If you are a smart auto exec serious about your future, you might want to setup a small shop in Oregon and build your own digital darkhorse in stealth mode. Start your motors!

Monday, February 16, 2009

Made in USA Digital Motors


























How many Made in USA digital automaking jobs are these pictures worth???

Thursday, February 5, 2009

The Digital Race


Ford, Porsche and most successful tinkerers turned automakers got their start in racing.  Ford focused on explosion engines after Edison pounded his fist encouraging Ford to drive off his limited grid and Porsche started out with hybrids setting land speed records to get the attention of Mercedes Benz father who recruited him over to Daimler.  They both sought speed years before they started some of the world's longest running automakers.

Believe it or not most everything we drive has roots in racing.

Looking forward, one can only imagine if these
digital designs and digital technologies will drive
the century of digital automaking dawning today?

One of the most intensive tests on any new racing technology
is a 24 hour race like the one this Gumpert Apollo Hybrid entered.

The future is looking efficient and fast!

Sunday, February 1, 2009

How fast would Edison think?

Before integrated circuits (ICs) and computer processing units (CPUs)...
computers filled buildings with glass tubes to punch holes in dead trees!

The era of analogue supercomputers also spawned the greatest American genre of automaking: "musclecars!"

Right before Silicon Valley delivered the first personal computer born in a wooden box to two hippies in the 60s (Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak genius billionaires) Detroit's motor city was pumping out masterpiece after masterpiece: from the 1st through 3rd gen Camaros, Corvettes, Mustangs, Firebirds, Trans Ams, Barracudas, Challengers, Chargers
to those famous components like "six-pack" "double-barrel" "4 on the floor"
the 60s and 70s were arguable the pinnacle of
American Automaking genius!!!

Then came the the Oil Embargo (1973) followed by Jobs and Woz rocking our world with the Personal Computer (PC) on April Fools, 1976!

Analogue American Automaking had a stroke as the stork delivered Digital Computers changing life on Earth forever.

Since the mid-70s American Automaking has been falling and Digital Computermaking has skyrocketed into every industry including automaking which buys 10 times more
computers than Silicon Valley type companies and develops many more digital patents than computer geeks themselves.

CAN THE HORSEPOWER BUSINESS MODEL SURVIVE???

The obvious answer is "horsepower" or "horses" which has been the basic business model ever
since Edison pounded his fist on the desk of his electric company encouraging Ford to
develop his stinky loud 4 wheel bike because it could travel beyond the electric grid.

Yes, the world's most famous electrician was the root
responsible party for 100 years of internal combustion engine
development driven by the quest for more horsepower...

Well, looking back to those beautiful 60s and 70s American Masterpieces of analogue automaking
one couldn't blame them for demanding more and more oil to feed the horsepower business model.

Unfortunately, the model broke first in the 70s killing every world class American design
except maybe the Corvette and Mustang and the engine blew in the 2000s requiring
funny money intravenous injections!!!

Shelby Hitches Electric Horsepower to World's Fastest Coach!!!

Jerod Shelby (not Carol Shelby associated with Mustangs)
has brought the "horsepower" business model back from
the dead by attaching a major Defibrillator to
the
"musclecars!"

"World's Fastest Production Car"
taking the cake over yesterday's kids
and even the automaking veteran Fisker.

NOT ONLY could Jerod's Digital Masterpiece
be
"World's Fastest Digital Automobile"
thanks to Jobs and Wozniak and not Edison
blowing by Tesla challenging the old adage
of "first mover" with "faster mover"
enforcing that MADE IN USA DIGITAL AUTOMAKING
is accelerating world-class status leading the global mobility revolution!!!

Congratulations Jerod AeroEVMedia@sscautos.com
enjoy this moment in the quest to become one of the
few automakers who survives the analogue to digital energy shakeout...


Saturday, January 31, 2009

Revolution Y


What do you get when you cross FREE wind & FREE sun with $$$ super capacitors???


Who says digital automaking can't clean, green and fast???

One look at the RORRMaxx and one could say the Revolution Y,
in other words, the design, idea, research and development of
digital transportation ideas by the LARGEST Generation EVER
to be born into and come to power in the United States of Automobiles
(YES!!! Generation Y outnumber Baby Boomers by millions)
is off and running and has hole shot out of the station!!!

HANG ON FOR A NEW GENERATION OF CLEAN, GREEN & SEXY TORQUE!!!

WAY TO GO Rory and Maxx,
you just proved that a picture is worth a thousand words
and have earned what other generation took centuries to gain
in a few simply sexy designs!!!

It doesn't hurt to be connected though
and even Bill Gates who runs the majority 
of every digital computer on this planet
also had a well connected father...

My expectations will be higher
but so far you have delivery the concept goods!!!

All the luck in implenting and KEEP UP THE GEN Y DIGITAL AUTOMAKING!!!

Fisker Karma: Sexy Green Luxury


  • The world's most important auto show
  • just opened to the public in "motor city!"

As predicted, the most sexy,
attention grabbing, exciting
and watched world debuts
were the Lithium and other
digital world premieres.

Fisker's Karma proves that
digital automaking is moving
from the startup to growth stage
showing that real technology
can be ramped just as fast as
a .com can develop a website!

Fisker and Tesla are starting the
digital revolution and the big
automakers are losing marketshare.

GREAT JOB Henrik and good luck
in the quest to be the last 1 or 2
digital automakers standing at the
end of the Lithium bubble...

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