A New Autonomy, A New Charging Network, R-Apple?

Paul J Daly: 0:00

It's Tuesday already, we're just getting started. We're just getting started. Today we're talking about new autonomy player, a new charging network and a potential partnership between Apple and an automaker, we're going to call we're not going to say till the end of the show. But tell us that we've never done that we should start doing that. Isn't that good strategy right. It's a great

‍Kyle Mountsier: 0:38

way to give up the hook. Paul, give him the hook.

Paul J Daly: 0:42

You know, it is blistering blistering pace around the halls of Minnesota.

Kyle Mountsier: 0:48

That's right, you'll

Paul J Daly: 0:48

halls of a soda right now. Thank goodness. I know. I don't even know what else to say. There's so many things to get excited about right out like insert in the Syracuse office. Like they're just boxes now. Everywhere we go. Like it looks like a storage facility because we have scarves and swag and signage and drop down banners and everything else that it to enlighting all the kinds of things it takes to put on a soda counter. A lot of the things are now in boxes ready to get loaded into a van this weekend to go to a certain con. Tickets are selling like crazy. Hotels are booking out cakes. They're not gone. We got plenty of hotels, their hotels, but the main hotel is gone. But there are other hotels, we've arranged a lot of options within like four blocks. So it's nice. A real fun thing we're doing so we're doing this well Canada's happening a meet up before day one. And so if you're a welcome member, make sure you get your soda to a soda con ticket and come to the meetup and welcome members get a special discount and cow you and I were on the Message Threads with Ashley and Carrie, some of the directors or senior leadership have woken because we are doing a special limited edition run of love people more than you can love but love people more than you love cars shirts, Nathan bring bring it out. It's already up. Look at this. Jeff's kiss a long sleeve T welcome members be looking out for an email to whether you're a member you're coming or not. We're releasing this t shirt. You can pick yours up at a soda con or we will ship yours out if you can't be there. And just a little Swag Shop announcement. I have been on the hunt for a year to find the perfect t shirt and we found that this is the nicest literally it's like a luxury cotton t shirt. It's grown in California of course I haven't even polyester in it or is it just nothing 100% Pure supima cotton, it's pre shrunk. The dyes are amazing. And the quality of this t shirt. I can literally say it is the nicest t shirt I've ever ever owned. We're switching all of our stuff over to them. So

Kyle Mountsier: 2:47

it literally had a baby's butt on standby and just rubbed

Paul J Daly: 2:51

like what do you know, it's the T shirts. The T shirt is better smoother. 100%. So we're also gonna release some new colors. We have a real nice natural shade coming out not white, but it's natural black print looks amazing. We have a rose gold metallic. We've got some new stuff, short sleeve, long sleeve, and we got all kinds of amazing swag coming to us. Otakon like high quality stuff we don't play why game on point. But I mean, that's that dims in comparison to the content, honestly, hills and compare. Oh, gosh, when you look down the speaker list and the agenda. Sometimes I'm like, I can't believe these

Kyle Mountsier: 3:26

people believe that conversation is going to be you know what? I can't I'll never forget who was it? Last year? Man, maybe it was Igor, Volkswagen.

Unknown: 3:37

When was he the one that said he came up and said someone came up and said to me that? Yes, that same titles, sometimes of sessions are at other events. But the boldness to say we'll call it nothing is different. It's like, people are given the freedom to actually speak their mind and not like do the little political dance, but actually say what needs to be said in the rooms at this event. And it's true, we're gonna make sure that happens again and again. And again, like don't beat around the bush,

Kyle Mountsier: 4:13

no fluff, say the thing that needs to be set.

Paul J Daly: 4:16

True. That's gonna happen a lot. Lots of dealers are almost to the point where we can say hundreds of dealers, we're getting real close to that marker. But yeah, this is a very amazing audience of people who are committed to growing together sharing best practices connecting with one another. So whether you're a dealer or an industry partner, this is a place where people are open minded, open hearted, I would say there's no other event in automotive where people show up just instantly ready to like connect and learn together and do some stuff and of course, like get really really nice T shirts.

Kyle Mountsier: 4:48

I would agree. I'm

Paul J Daly: 4:49

sure I'm the only place where that exists because I have yet to see anything close to as nice as any automotive event ever.

Kyle Mountsier: 4:56

Thanks for being able to buy really nice T shirts, Paul. I

Paul J Daly: 5:01

had missed the Segway. Oh the funding I'm like I just wanted to thank our presenting sponsors, Ronald, Uber Gu Oh, that's that's because like you need people to help you set the table to have a meal like this. And Reynolds and goober Gu really stepped up. Help us. We have a bunch of sponsors. We're gonna be talking about those. We call them collaborators. You'll see them walking around with a badge that says, collaborators. We sent the badges off the print yesterday. They're super dope too. All right. Speaking of a billion dollars. Segway that didn't cost us $10. But wave technology, this is w a y v. E is pioneering self driving car startup that have secured just secured over a billion dollars in investment to enhance AI based autonomous driving solutions for the auto industry. So it includes the round of funding major players like Softbank, Nvidia, Microsoft, all aiming to boost AI capabilities. They're going to fuel global expansion enhance data diversity. I've never heard that term before, and strengthen partnerships pushing the frontier of driving automation. So basically, they have what they call embodied AI, which allows cars to understand and learn from human behavior, improving like interaction and safety soft banks Kintaro Matsui said vehicles can now interpret their surroundings like humans, enabling enhanced decision making that promises higher safety standards. Even

Kyle Mountsier: 6:20

the UK Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak praised the investment underscoring Britain's growing influence in the AI industry. Look, obviously right now. Sounds like money goes to AI, like the money for the last year has been going to AI if it was the year before Metaverse the money right now goes to AI. And clearly, obviously, Softbank has always been a leader in net new technology and funding it and then Nvidia, they have a big part to play in this because if it works, you can darn betcha that their chips are going to be good hovering, like 99% of this thing. So it's it's a it's a smart investment on on multiple fronts. And obviously Microsoft has leaned in with their investment in things like chat GPT or open AI really. And so, I like what if you are going to have self driving in the midst of non self driving, right? You have to have this level of focus on the technology behind it. Without a doubt not all the vehicles are talking then you have to make some decisions and you know, we'll see how it goes but I'm I'm impressed. billion bucks. That's just as the funding couple

Paul J Daly: 7:38

dollars. Couple of dollars. That's funny. Imran who is a awesome part of our community just commented on like what are the special days today? Well, speaking of a billion dollars, and it happens to be Mr. Beast birthday today. We're talking about a billion dollars. Happy birthday. Happy birthday, Jimmy Donaldson. Somebody offered him a billion dollars to buy the company and he turned it down like a year or two ago, Gary Vaynerchuk was like it might be more like 10 billion and I think Gary's gonna historically be proven, right speaking and people are trying to be historically proven right? So hey let's see this one coming, but the timing is impeccable. rivian has announced a next generation charging network prototype, designed to service all EVs positioning itself as a key player in evey infrastructure charging obviously, we know Tesla has been backing off on their supercharger development fire the whole team so ravines like oh yeah, check this out. The new charging stations feature a taller profile and longer cables so they can accommodate various Evie charging port locations including vehicles with the NAC s ports, which are now the standard. They have adapters for now, but they do plan to integrate the new SAE J 3400, which is the universal nacsw port into the network. So basically, they're calling it I love how they branded it to Tesla's supercharger, the rivian adventure network. It's so brilliant, it's very good. Both is going to support both 408 100 volt systems. Along key travel routes in the US Paul Frey VP of battery charging and adventure products said by broadening access to our Rivia N adventure network powered by 100% renewable energy are supporting both the critical goals also while encouraging more people to embark on their next adventure in an Eevee not even just a rivian Evie, but just an Eevee and they're set to begin retrofitting existing locations with new charges later this year, including self special versions for vehicles towing trailers. I get those years up in there those boaters, motorcyclists, etc. I've said

Kyle Mountsier: 9:42

whether it's a car company, or whether it's a dealership, multi, like multi siloed revenue streams within the same type of technology are are going to be extremely important. And so for rivian to go yep, we see To charging network as not just amplifying our ability to get into the market, but to have a revenue stream in the market. That's you're gonna see that play repeated over and over and over. I think the key one that kind of snuck its way in here is that these in particular are also going to be powered by 100% renewable energy and not having to pull power from a grid that's maybe powered by non renewable energy is that key? Because that's one thing that I think multiple states, especially the large states has have been concerned with, on whether or not the power grid can actually support this charging network. And so this gets off the grid and goes turn Oh,

Paul J Daly: 10:44

I don't know if it's off the grid. Because vegetable energy,

Kyle Mountsier: 10:48

I mean, that's the way I read it. Maybe Kevin

Paul J Daly: 10:52

Frey, who many of you know, Jeff Wyler, automotive kind of a legendary voice in the modern day auto industry. He posted a picture on Twitter yesterday or x. And it was like, multiple barges full of coal. And he was just took a picture of it. And he says, I bet these are on their way to the power plants to make electric for all those Evie

Kyle Mountsier: 11:10

Oh, that's what that that's.

Paul J Daly: 11:13

Yeah, that's not renewable. That's solar power. Yeah. So no, wind and solar does feed into the grid.

Kyle Mountsier: 11:22

And but that's not 100%

Paul J Daly: 11:25

I know. It's complicated. That's why we don't get into it speaking relationships that are complicated, but maybe very surprising. Longer longest segway in the history of segways

Kyle Mountsier: 11:33

supercycle This is a little bit more on the old rumor side of stock, but Apple seems to maybe not have shelved its complete electric vehicle dreams. With a little whisper little side whispers suggesting a potential partnership with the aforementioned Rivia be unreal. What was it a little over a month ago, Apple was came out and said that they were halting Project Titan, their their in house, Evie, startup and rivian being named as a potential partner Sources close to the supply chain hit and Apple's interest in leveraging its decade of Evie and autonomous driving research in the partnership rather than going in alone. This could be the crucial capital that rivian could need to see sustainability and enhance its own production of Evie models. There is not much information out there again, mostly rumors, this report is from a company called DigiTimes. There's no doubt that the implications for both companies could be significant. If Apple is bringing its tech and brand power to the EB sector, which we've all known and all been a little bit, you know, chattery teeth about for

Paul J Daly: 12:53

the rumors start I mean, the sense that again, we're talking about like this is kind of like a speculation. But it started with some suppliers. So Apple suppliers that were supplying Project Titan, there's been some chatter about like, Don't shut it down. Because there's like, this stuff might need to go somewhere, there might be a partnership where we need to keep these lines open and keep making stuff. And I have to say, when I read this, I was like a rivian apple partnership couldn't make more sense. Like even when you look at a rivian vehicle, like you picture an apple logo on that thing. And you're like, yeah, that's kind of it kind of serials the layout. I mean, that would be a game changer. Oh my gosh,

Kyle Mountsier: 13:36

it would, it would be shocking, because Rivens already figured out the manufacturing process and you know, their their recent investment, you know, it's all kind of lining up charging network recent investment in Illinois. Again, potential Apple partnership,

Paul J Daly: 13:53

I'll be holding your Tesla stock when that's announced. Watch out for it. Y'all watch out for it. Oh, my goodness. So it's a lot of fun to speculate. We probably won't be speculating about this at ASOTU CON, but we'll be talking about actual things that you can actually do in your actual real life and real dealership to make it better. Serve your people better serve your customers better. Go check out ASOTU con.com. We'll see you tomorrow.

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