IIHS Toughens Small-Overlap Barrier Crash Test

Vehicles can no longer earn a top safety rating from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety unless they deliver the same front-end crash protection on the passenger side that they do for the driver.

U.K. Moves to Double Public Charging Ports, Insure Self-Driving Cars

This week Britain’s House of Commons introduced a bill that would significantly increase the number of chargers for electric vehicles and require insurance companies to cover vehicles with autonomous driving capabilities.

Ricardo Adds Power Electronics/Vehicle Labs to California Tech Center

Ricardo Inc. is opening two laboratories at its three-year-old technical center in Santa Clara, Calif., to support the development of electrified and autonomous vehicles.

Denso, FotoNation Team on Advanced Driver Monitoring Tech

Denso Corp is working with Xperi Corp.’s FotoNation unit on a next-generation image recognition system to better measure driver attentiveness and readiness to take control of a vehicle during autonomous driving operation.

Ex-Opel Tech Chief Will Help Monitor VW Emission Work

Rita Forst, a former head of technology development at Adam Opel AG, has been hired to help monitor Volkswagen AG’s emission control compliance in the wake of the VW diesel emission cheating scandal.

Northvolt Choose Sweden for EV Battery Factory

Stockholm-based Northvolt AB has selected a site in Skelleftea, Sweden, to erect a huge factory that makes cells for electric-vehicle batteries.

Nissan Halts Production in Japan for 2 Weeks

Nissan Motor Co. began a two-week production shutdown today in Japan to reconfigure its government-mandated final inspection process.

Report: Tesla Hikes Pay 30% at German Engineering Unit

Tesla Inc. has boosted salaries about 30% for employees at its Tesla Grohmann Automation GmbH unit in Pruem, Germany, the company’s works council tells Reuters.

Toyota Shows Long-Range Fuel Cell Concept Car

Toyota Motor Corp. says its latest fuel cell-powered concept car can travel 50% farther on a tank of hydrogen than the company’s current Mirai fuel cell sedan.

Baidu to Debut Self-Driving Bus in 2018

Chinese internet search engine giant Baidu Inc. plans to introduce a bus in China next year that is fully capable of driving itself along a designated route.