AUTOMOTIVE

Digital Dealer Las Vegas Is a Wrap!

We are back from Digital Dealer in Las Vegas and are excited to share what we saw and heard!

We saw

Dealers focused on delivering their communities the best experience, value, and inventory.

Industry partners working to keep dealers powerfully present in the more-digital-everyday market. And, of course,

Digital Dealer championing conversations between the two.

We heard

People who have listened to and are quickly evolving along with the market.

A commitment to increase accuracy to cut waste from our industry.

Industry partners who are all too aware that one size does not fit all anymore.

We left the Expo encouraged to welcome tomorrow's challenges and opportunities with the brilliant people who make it all it is.

Telling it like it is - Got pictures and takeaways from your time at Digital Dealer? Send them our way!

AUTOMOTIVE

Solving The Charging Issue

👩‍🚀🌙 Hard truth: NASA did not invent velcro. They popularly used it in the Apollo missions, but the Swiss invented it in the 1940s. We are not sure why everybody lied to us about this, but now we know and can begin the healing process.

🔬🥼 However, NASA is currently experimenting with technology that could shorten EV charging times dramatically.

🥵🌡 Subcooling flow boiling is a process developed by NASA and Purdue University that will fully charge an EV in 5 minutes.

☢️🔌 Purdue has been researching fast-charging technology for a while. NASA was looking for a way to bring nuclear fission power systems on missions to the moon and beyond.

🥶❄️ In both instances, the barrier was cooling cables faster than faster energy transfer overheating them.

Explain it like I'm 5 - Moving energy creates heat. These cables put that heat in water and then put that hot water in colder water until it's not hot anymore. And they do it faster than a rocket. 🚀

TOGETHER WITH MAKE

Work Faster, Better.

Everything that gets measured gets managed, and if it gets measured with powerful visuals, it’s more fun to manage.

Make provides your team with a time-saving workflow and task-tracking system that can be customized to automate any project management needs. Their app keeps your people connected and syncs up-to-date data across your user base. So you can turn that data into action.

Check out Make today and see what their powerful visual platform can do for you.

AROUND THE ASOTU-VERSE

The Automotive Troublemaker Podcast
- Burnt Hair is All the Rage, Carvana Petitions, and Connecting Coffee and Flying
Auto Collabs
- Students of the Industry with Michael Lucki and Matthew Vollmers
Clubhouse
- How to Build a Buy Center Part 2

AUTOMOTIVE

Sony Honda Mobility Set 2025 Pre-Order Date

Sony Honda Mobility announced they will open online pre-orders for their upcoming car in 2025 and deliver them the following year. Then they didn't show us the car, only hinted at a “higher price,” and gave us no hint about its battery range. 🤷

The joint venture has Sony in charge of software and sensors, including a Level 3 conditional automation driver assistance system. Other in-vehicle software features focused on entertainment or metaverse connectivity are under consideration.

All this fancy software can be yours if you buy a car and THEN pay a monthly subscription to ensure its features keep working.

Telling it like it is - A few years ago, Sony started charging PlayStation owners a monthly fee to play online games. Something about turning off advanced safety features when people miss payments feels… different.

MARKETS

Retail, Entertainment, and Coffee

Some interesting things are happening in the business tab of Google news. We decided to grab a few, pull a helpful automotive thought👩‍🎓 and make a joke🤡 for each. Enjoy!

Looking for your new signature scent? Elon Musk has you covered! His "Burnt Hair" perfume sold 10K bottles, grabbing a million dollars, just a few hours after launch. "The essence of repugnant desire" will start shipping in Q1 of 2023.

👩‍🎓Silly sells. Put on a weird hat and make a TikTok!

🤡Perfume is already kinda weird, "Oh look, I captured the ghost of a flower!" but now it's weird on purpose.

Folks visiting the happiest place on earth will get 9% less happiness for their buck. Disneyland tickets and going up again, along with some of the extras. Florida's Disney World tickets are unchanged, but things like preferred parking, line skipping, and food options have increased.

👩‍🎓Data shows people are cutting back on entertainment spending due to inflation. Disney is balancing fewer ticket sales with higher per-ticket-price and making it worth it by providing a flawless experience. Is anybody getting deja vu?

🤡Splash Mountain better be 9% more splashy and mountainous, or we ain't paying!

Y'all ever been jittery 30K feet in the air?! Delta Air Lines and Starbucks will get you there. A new partnership will allow customers to link their loyalty memberships for added benefits. Benefits include miles for dollars spent, bonus Starbucks Stars on the day of a flight, and a 500-mile, 150-Star bonus for linking accounts.

👩‍🎓 Delta found a way to make customers who may only fly twice a year think positively about their brand twice a week.

🤡 Anecdote time: One Christmas, I received a gift card to a restaurant I don't even like, but you better believe I was there the following weekend using those points. -Chris

QUICK HITS

Greece was powered by renewable energy for 5 hours
Digital license plates are now legal in California
Netflix will receive Nielsen ratings in 2023