Detroit’s Electric Vehicle Makers Charge Ahead
The electric vehicle market is accelerating fast, with the Motor City making big news and driving change. DNC is helping to make it all happen with precision logistics, warehousing, and inventory management.
Big moves are being made by General Motors, Rivian, Bollinger Motors and Hercules Electric Mobility–all ramping up production in Metro Detroit, blazing a new pathway for personal mobility and trucking, and helping to shape the region’s exciting future.Here’s how:
- General Motors revealed its largest-ever investment in a single plant — $2.2 billion – to retool its Detroit-Hamtramck plant as an all-electric vehicle center. Plans call for rolling out the GMC Hummer electric pickup and other EV models by late 2021, in what a GM vice-president called “our journey to an all-electric future.”
- The new GM Hummer is nicknamed “Supertruck” and carries a $112,595 sticker price. Also: 1,000 horsepower and zero to 60 in three seconds.
- Amazon said it will invest $440 million in Plymouth-based Rivian to produce custom electric delivery vehicles for worldwide customers. Deliveries are expected by 2022. Amazon’s global fleet director called the vehicle “the future of last mile delivery.”
- Bollinger Motors – based in Oak Park – said it will produce battery packs for its electric trucks – while signaling it expects to announce a vehicle manufacturing partner soon. Its focus: Low-volume sales of $125,000 sport utility vehicles and trucks.
- Transport Topics: “Bollinger Motors to Build Battery Packs for Its Electric Trucks”
- Detroit’s Hercules Electric Mobility said it will team up with Toronto-based Worksport Ltd. to produce a truck bed, solar panel system to provide more energy punch for pickup trucks. The goal, said Hercules CEO James Breyer: “Part of a luxury experience without plug-anxiety.”
If you’re plugging into the EVolution of the auto industry, call on us to move your batteries,
electric engines, motor controllers, regenerative braking systems and charging station components.
Made in Michigan: Healthcare
Hot spot for growth, opportunity
Southeast Michigan is getting an economic shot in the arm with the growing healthcare industry. Biosciences are big here—and creating a range of promising new products.
Our overlooked, essential industry: Michigan is home to some 1,700 bioscience businesses and the state’s life sciences industry is a $28 billion sector employing more than 130,000 Michiganders. Before COVID, the industry flew “just below the radar screen,” said the president of Ann Arbor-based MichBio. From manufacturing to logistics, the industry made the pivot to produce personal protection equipment to fight the deadly virus. Next: Post-pandemic planning.
Quick Quiz: Which Michigan manufacturer is on every continent except Antarctica? Cortiva Inc. is mammoth, with 21,000 employees worldwide and revenue of more than $9 billion in the first six months of this year. Crain’s Detroit Business reported that the Cortiva Michigan hub – which produces pesticides and herbicides – is in the midst of a major expansion with construction likely to continue into 2022. It already has 800 employees and employs 300 local contractors.
To Your Health: Two Ann Arbor medical supply companies have launched new products, according to DBusiness. BlueWillow Biologics introduced NanoBio Protect, an alcohol-free, over-the-counter nasal antiseptic proven to kill 99.9 percent of infection-causing germs. Micro-Tech Endoscopy launched its PinPoint Injection Needle, designed for single-handed operation.
Call on us to pick up and deliver the equipment needed to set up COVID-19 vaccination centers–including refrigeration units, personal protection equipment, sterile wipes, syringes, and furnishings.
News In Small Packages
From pickups to warehouse “skeletons” and long-haul doggies
Find out what people are talking about in the world of transportation. It’s a lot to keep track of but, don’t worry! DNC stays on top of all these trends to ensure we can give the right guidance to our customers.
Driving Up Prices: Buyers are hitting the road and paying record sums for used pickup trucks. An auto industry economist calls it the “hottest market” he’s ever seen. Demand is so great that truck shoppers are traveling hundreds of miles, with average prices up 31.5 percent since February. Why? The pandemic has cooled enthusiasm for mass transit just as automakers shut plants from Canada to Mexico.
“Soft Shell” Warehouse Workers: A new class of modern exoskeletons is being deployed in warehouses to help workers battle strain, fatigue and injury. Lightweight and easy to use, the soft, textile-based wearables are supporting worker wellness against musculoskeletal disorders. DBusiness reports that Ford and GM are in the first significant wave of wearable robotics, along with BMW, Toyota, Guardhat in downtown Detroit, among others.
- DC Velocity: “The rise of exoskeletons in logistics”
- Dbusiness: “Robot Wear”
Keep Those Doggies Rollin’? A furry friend riding shotgun is insufficient to exempt truck drivers from federal rules to report their hours at the wheel and on the job. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration denied an appeal to extend the workday for truckers taking Fido along for the ride. The Small Business in Transportation Coalition had asked that commercial motor vehicle driers be permitted to add two hours to their driving time “so they can take multiple rests for the comfort and convenience of their pets.” Safety concerns outweighed the benefits from “driver feelings of companionship,” the feds said.
- Transport Topics: “FMCSA Denies ELD Exemption for Drivers Traveling with Pets”
It seems it’s always construction season in southeast Michigan.
At DNC Logistics we keep close tabs on all the bottlenecks so that our drivers can avoid them and get your goods picked up and delivered right on time. We thought you might want to know, too.
- Road and bridge projects that could get in your way…
- 75 & 696 bottle-necked during rush hour
- 75 north ramp to 696 east & west close
- 696 & 275 bottle-necked during rush hour
- Big Beaver Rd. to 75 entrance ramps closed
- 94 between 96 and 75 bottle-necked during rush hour
- 94 and 23 bottle-necked during rush hour
- m-10 Lodge north & south ramp to 94 east closed
- Martin Rd. closed between Gratiot and Groesbeck
- Hayes Rd. closed between 14 mile and 15 mile