Honda Motor will end production this year of the lone electric vehicle it sells in the U.S., the latest retrenchment for battery-powered cars in the American market. The 2026 model year will be the last for Honda’s Prologue SUV, said Lance Woelfer, the vice president of automobile sales for American Honda Motor Co. The company isn’t canceling sales immediately, but expects them to continue through early 2027 as inventory winds down.

Source: Wall Street Journal

A relic of GM’s complex history will soon be a thing of the past itself as the automaker has begun demolition of the building that once served as Pontiac Headquarters. Most recently, it’s been referred to as “Building A” of the Pontiac Engineering Center, and has been closed since 2020. It reportedly offered 300,000 square feet of space with a capacity of 1,000 workers.

From 2010 to 2020, the building was known as GM’s Global Propulsion Systems facility. Back in 2018, the automaker made reassurances that the shift of 3,000 workers from Pontiac to Warren had no implications regarding future corporate development at the site. That may have been the case, but the conclusion made by Mayor of Pontiac at the time, Deirdre Waterman, still turned out to be true.

Before “Pontiac” was stripped from its name in 2010, the building was originally called One Pontiac Plaza from the day it opened in the 1970s. It was also referred to as the Pontiac Motors Administration Building. Although it may bear a great deal of historical significance, the automaker has determined that it doesn’t suit future operations. “Its removal is part of ongoing site improvements to optimize our footprint and align with our business strategy,” a GM spokesperson said in a statement provided to the Detroit Free Press. “The demolition work will be carried out under a detailed plan designed to prioritize safety, minimize disruption to nearby employees and community neighbors, and meet or exceed all applicable environmental and local regulatory requirements.”

Future plans for the site are currently unknown, and GM says it will reveal what’s in store once the demolition is finished.

Source: GM Authority

The US automotive market is not just about who sells the most vehicles. The numbers reveal which OEM strategies are winning. 🚗

While General Motors, Toyota Motor Corporation, and Ford Motor Company remain dominant, brands like Honda, KIA Motors, and Stellantis continue to gain ground through competitive SUV and hybrid portfolios. 

Meanwhile, Tesla’s estimated 20% decline shows that even market disruptors cannot rely on early leadership forever. On the other hand, Volkswagen Group has been facing several challenges in North America, and its sales keep dropping.
These shifts teach the industry that success requires more than just scale. 

Product affordability, hybrid flexibility, diversified powertrains, localized manufacturing, software capabilities, and rapid adaptation to customer demand are reshaping this landscape.

With Chinese OEMs fully prepared and actively launching their global expansion, the pressure on established automakers will only intensify.

Source: ENERGYDM

Expensive electric pickups are proving a hard sell in the U.S., based on declining 2026 sales and steep discounts on these vehicles from automakers such as General Motors. While mass adoption of EVs has been slower in the U.S. than in Europe, these large pickups are moving off lots at an especially glacial rate. High prices, lower capability than gas-powered trucks, and the loss of the federal tax credit have all impacted this category. Over the first half of 2026, all but one full-size electric pickup — the GM Sierra EV — has seen a decline in sales.

Source: TheStreet

The sedan was meant to launch Lexus’ next-generation electric lineup and showcase advanced manufacturing technologies.
The Lexus LF-ZC was its flagship, its next-generation electric vehicle that was supposed to rocket launch the automaker’s battery-electric ambitions while showcasing a host of advanced manufacturing technologies designed to make Toyota more competitive with EV leaders such as Tesla. Instead, the Japanese automaker gave it the ax. The decision marks a big step back from plans unveiled in 2023, when Lexus placed the LF-ZC sedan at the center of a new family of EVs. The production version was slated to launch this year and play a starring role in Lexus’ goal of selling up to 1 million EVs annually by 2030 while transitioning to an all-electric lineup by 2035.

Toyota said the cancellation was decided on after a companywide review of vehicle programs, reports Automotive News. The move isn’t exactly surprising, coming as many automakers across the industry have been rethinking their EV investment and goals. Honda, Mazda, and Subaru have all scaled back or delayed EV programs in recent months, while US domestic automakers have all slowed their electric rolls since demand softened and government incentives were eliminated.

The LF-ZC (for Lexus Future Zero-emission Catalyst) debuted alongside the LF-ZL crossover concept at the 2023 Japan Mobility Show. It demonstrated advanced production techniques including gigacasting, a process pioneered by Tesla, as well as self-propelled vehicles on factory lines, and modular assembly systems. The automaker insists it remains committed to battery-electric vehicles despite killing off the LF-ZC.

And yet rather than investing in dedicated EV architectures, Lexus increasingly has turned its focus more to platforms that can spin off multiple powertrains variants, most notably, hybrid electric vehicles. Toyota and Lexus sold 188,785 EVs globally in the fiscal year ended March 31, up 31 percent from a year earlier but still accounting for just 1.8 percent of the company’s worldwide sales volume.

Source: Autoweek

Trade-ins in negative equity hit a record high in the second quarter, nearly three out of 10 trade-ins toward new vehicles in an under-water position. According to Edmunds, it was the highest second-quarter figure since 2020 in the depth of the Covid pandemic. The average negative-equity amount in the quarter was $6,884, which Edmunds marked as a record high for a second quarter. The surge has led to the highest figure the automotive data provider has on record for average monthly payments on new-vehicle loans with a negative equity trade-in: $944.

Source: F&I Showroom Magazine 

The U.S. Senate Commerce Committee approved legislation on Wednesday to toughen a government ‌ban on Chinese automakers entering the American market that could bar German automaker Mercedes-Benz from selling vehicles in the United States. Senator Ted Cruz, the committee chair and a Texas Republican, said the bill's provision that would ban companies with more than 15% ownership by Chinese entities would bar Mercedes-Benz from selling vehicles in the United States because of its nearly 20% passive Chinese investment. He said the bill required changes before it could become law.

Source: Reuters

The Edsel is one of the greatest and most infamous flops in automotive history, but it's in trouble. It's perilously close to being dethroned by a newcomer: the Tesla Cybertruck. Despite the fact that their debuts are separated by over 65 years, they bear some striking similarities. Both were predicted to sell over 200,000 units in their first year on the market, both have — uh — unusual design languages, both have suffered sales drops every year they've been on sale and both have become the punchlines of their respective eras.

After unveiling the Edsel in 1957, sales dropped every year until its ultimate cancellation in 1959. Somehow, Cybertruck sales are off to an even worse start, according to Bloomberg. As I mentioned, Ford planned to sell 200,000 Edsels in its first year. In 1958, it ultimately sold 63,110 of them, and in 1959, that number dropped to 44,891. Tesla wishes it could hit those sales numbers. Despite CEO Elon Musk thinking it could hit a quarter-million registrations in its first year, in 2024, Tesla registered just 38,965 Cybertrucks. The number was sliced to 20,237 in 2025, and through May of this year, just 7,133 Cybertrucks have been registered in the U.S. Keep in mind, a good chunk of that is because Musk's other companies — like SpaceX — have built up fleets of the things.

Despite the sales SNAFU, Tesla's newfound emphasis on driverless vehicles and humanoid robots means the Cybertruck probably won't be outright canceled, according to Bloomberg. Instead, it'll probably just fade away, quietly and pathetically. Perhaps Tesla will try some sort of mid-cycle refresh to drum up sales, but its weird styling, high price, hideous unreliability, limited usability and the fact it reminds everyone of Musk are going to make that a pretty tough ask.

Bad design, bad sales

At the end of the day, much can be forgiven about a car if it looks good. The thing is, that's one thing the Edsel and Cybertruck really don't have going for them. You'll be hard-pressed to find folks who have a nice thing to say about the design of either, and some of that compromised design means the usability was equally compromised, as Bloomberg explained: