Transpo

Micro is now offering “over a thousand unique customization options” for the four-wheeled all-electric mini car I reviewed last year. Everything from exterior accents and trim, to interior upholstery, to the battery can be tweaked to match your whims and whimsy. Clearly — matte grey with Amsterdam orange accents is the only way to go.

The first personalized Microlinos created with the new configurator will be delivered in the spring.

I sat in the Sony Honda car a year ago, six months ago, and now — improvements are slow. AI is new for 2025, but the chatbot got far too easily confused. I couldn’t see the lidar in action. I like the digital mirrors, though.

It’ll be 2026 before journalists can test-drive it, Sony Honda Mobility director Shugo Yamaguchi confirms, though the company’s already taking preorders for what’s now a $90K car.

Delta’s CES keynote at the Sphere was truly an experience for all five senses. Wind whipped through my hair as a plane turned on a runway, and at one point, the place filled with the smell of hazelnut coffee as an Uber Eats driver “delivered” drinks to the speakers onstage. This recap doesn’t capture that aroma, but you’ll get an idea of the whole spectacle.

The UAW has asked federal labor regulators for a union election at a new Kentucky factory co-owned by Ford and South Korean battery company SK On.

This could be the first big test for organized labor under Trump. The UAW filed federal labor charges against the former president and Elon Musk over perceived attempts to threaten workers during an interview in August — before Trump was re-elected and Musk became his right-hand man.

Denver’s much-lauded subsidy program has helped more than 9,000 residents afford an e-bike. And those bikes are being used in lieu of car trips — a lot of car trips. According to Mother Jones:

Research commissioned by the city in 2022 found that voucher recipients rode 26 miles a week on average, and many were using their e-bikes year-round. If even half of those miles are miles not driven, it means—conservatively, based on total e-bikes redeemed to date—the program will have eliminated more than 6.1 million automobile miles a year. That’s the equivalent of taking up to 478 gas-powered vehicles off the road, which would reduce annual CO2 emissions by nearly 190,000 metric tons.

The automaker said it would file an appeal after a Delaware judge rejected Musk’s $56 billion pay package a second time, and now it officially has, as reported by Bloomberg Law. The state’s Supreme Court will now review the appeal.

The custom Alexa voice assistant for BMW vehicles was initially announced in 2022, but progress has been slow in an attempt to build it around Amazon’s more capable LLM-powered Alexa.

Amazon says its “LLM-powered capabilities” will start rolling out to select BMW models this year that allow users to “plan trips and navigate more conversationally.”

Delta’s about to host a big, splashy CES keynote in Vegas’ biggest, roundest screen. And really, what’s more CES than a big spectacle and a giant screen? We’re going to hear from CEO Ed Bastian, and in the meantime, there are experiences to experience. How very Vegas.

John Deere has its autonomous vehicles on display here. They are, and I cannot emphasize this enough, big. Or at least this dump truck and tractor are. Is there interesting tech on board? Yep. But I'm not gonna lie, I'm here to take pictures of the big tractors because they are big and cool as hell.

If you missed it last night, here’s the moment we found out the pricing for both trim levels of Sony / Honda’s Afeela 1 EV:  $89,900 for the Afeela 1 Origin and $102,900 for the Afeela 1 Signature.

Preorders are open now, unless you prefer a PS5 Pro and Gran Turismo 7 as a cheaper option.

Here’s our first look at the “production-intent” Pebble Flow all-electric trailer. It can be moved into position by remote control thanks to a dual-motor system that can eliminate range-sapping drag when pulled by EVs. It features a massive 45kWh house battery and 1.1kW of rooftop solar to keep everything running for days. It starts at $109,500 with first deliveries available in the spring.

Here’s a sneak peak at the all electric Ferrari wearing full camouflage and making a simulated Ferrari rumble ahead of its launch later this year. As noted by Electrek, the prototype shows some exposed wiring and brackets up front and fake tailpipes glued to the back. 

On deck: updates about how to pre-order Afeela, the electric vehicle Sony is making with Honda.

During his CES press conference today, Toyota Chairman Akio Toyoda said the company was “exploring rockets.” Indeed, Toyota had just announced that it had invested an undisclosed sum in Interstellar Technologies, a private Japanese spaceflight company, with the aim to leverage Toyota’s manufacturing prowess to mass produce rockets.

At the end of the event, Toyoda cracked that “the future of mobility shouldn’t be limited to just Earth, or just one car company” — a possible dig at Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s ownership of SpaceX.

The company is expected to update its progress on Woven City, its “living laboratory” in Japan for future mobility projects. Tune in here.

During LG’s CES 2025 presentation, it showed off its AI assistant running in a simulated car cabin and helped the driver order coffee and detour to pick it up. However, it also warned the driver about their elevated heart rate, which the driver assured was because of work-related stress. LG AI then played soothing music to help with that.

The new tolling scheme that charges people $9 to drive below 60th Street in Manhattan went live at 12:00:01AM on Sunday. New York joins London, Singapore, Milan, and other global cities to force drivers to shoulder some of the burden in paying for good public transportation. I wrote about how congestion pricing can save cities from robot-powered gridlock back in 2019 — check it out.

If I still rode a motorcycle I’d be tempted by the Zumo R1 to increase my awareness about all the nearby cagers trying to kill me. Just not sure it’s worth $600, given the false positives I’ve seen produced by radar units I’ve tried on bicycles, in much less traffic.

Rideshare rides in lower Manhattan will cost an extra $1.50 as part of a new rideshare congestion fee starting tomorrow.

As TechCrunch spotted, Lyft has announced that through the end of January, it will give that back as account credits that can be used within a week for Lyft or Citi Bike rides