The heartland is in a sweet spot for electric vehicle adoption in some ways, but EV ownership is low in most states in the middle of the U.S. Price is one issue, said panelists at the “What’s it going to take to drive EV adoption in the heartland?” session at the Electrify Expo Industry Day conference in Long Beach in southern California in late May. But other factors play a role, and dealers need to ... [Read More]

Digital auditing is now enabling floorplan and wholesale finance companies to “self-audit” physical auto and equipment inventory, leveraging artificial intelligence, machine learning and API integration. At this year’s Auto Intel Summit + National Remarketing Conference presented by SmartAuction in Cary, N.C.., Marguerite Watanabe of Connections Insights moderated a panel discussion about how these digital audits […] [Read More]

At the beginning of May, new-vehicle inventory was estimated at 2.84 million, which was 51% higher year-over-year and at the highest point since late 2020, according to vAuto Live Market View. And Black Book is saying that automakers are sending more volume to the wholesale market, too, even as analysts saw an accelerated depreciation rate […] [Read More]

Orbee and ActivEngage are working together to help dealerships. This week, the provider of customer experience middleware for the automotive industry said it has integrated with the automotive chat and text communications platform. Orbee and ActivEngage highlighted their integration allows for the data from a shopper’s interaction through the ActivEngage platform to be unified with […] [Read More]

Last year, ZT Automotive, the automotive portfolio entity of ZT Corporate, announced a strategy to “transform” the dealership group to create “deeper alignment across its dealerships that drives operational efficiencies and an enhanced customer journey.” In the first half of 2024, the company has taken a big step toward that transformation with the addition of […] [Read More]

In the face of uncertainty in the automotive market, the American economy in general and the nation’s political future, the outlook of car dealers remains remarkably steady, according to the latest Cox Automotive Dealer Sentiment Index. Of course, that’s not necessarily a good thing. The index for the second quarter of 2024 was virtually unchanged […] [Read More]

CarNow has introduced a new software system to make digital retailing simpler for independent car dealers and their customers. The company said Conversion+ is a “shopper-centric” system that was developed starting with CarNow’s Real Time Retail platform, a full suite of integrated services for franchised dealerships, then removing complexities that often exceed the needs of […] [Read More]

S&P Global Market Intelligence recently indicated that as generative artificial intelligence technology pivots from research to the monetization and product launch stages, the software part of the generative AI market should see significant expansion. Experts predicted the market should reach $52.2 billion by 2028 with a compound annual growth rate of 58% from 2023. Published […] [Read More]

A quartet of industry experts from EY were straightforward with attendees at this year’s Auto Intel Summit + National Remarketing Conference presented by SmartAuction in Cary, N.C. Innovate or else. During this episode of the Auto Remarketing Podcast, listen to a panel discussion when the EY experts — Courtney Dusseau, Katie Johar, Bryan Chance and […] [Read More]

The National Automotive Finance Association elected new officers for its executive committee last week during the 28th annual Non-Prime Auto Financing Conference in Fort Worth, Texas. The group set to serve one-year terms will be led by president Claudia Plascencia, who is senior vice president at Resolvion. Joining Plascencia on the executive committee will be: […] [Read More]