Dr. Andy Palmer

46 years in the auto business. Proud to launch iconic cars as CEO of Aston Martin & COO of Nissan (incl Valkyrie & LEAF). Now on a mission to help the planet🌍

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

My apprenticeship gave me some of the best days of my life & equipped me with the skills needed to lead businesses at the forefront of the auto industry. For employers & employees alike, apprenticeships add huge value. Find out more in this film with @TheTimes & @BizSupportGovUK.

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

38k feet, 520mph, -50C and overlooking Novosibirsk looking at Gods own sunset.

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

@chuffnut21 BYD quality issue coupled with poor in market support from their lease and dealer partner - which is 101 for any brand going to market

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

This hurts to write (let’s call it tough love), but I believe that in full transparency, in advocating for EVs one must also acknowledge the downsides. My company leases a BYD Sealion (and other EV’s on the fleet) - on paper, it’s great value for money. A Chinese car @BYDCompany leased via @santanderuk But then we had an issue with a door harness - took the car to Hartwell Bracknell; they can’t fix the car - it’s been off the road 71 days chasing faults around the car. Santander don’t want to answer the phone (2.5hrs on hold today) and BYD are unhelpful with a car that has a seemly a catastrophic fault.

The cars a lemon (and frankly so are the leasing company and the dealer), the question really is, are all their cars lemons or is this a one-off?

Clearly BYD aren’t ready for scale in U.K. and don’t have the dealer back up you’d expect of a mass brand - so as much as I advocate for low cost EVs, my advice at least in the short term, is steer clear of the BYD! The same might be said of Santander leases and Hartwell dealers!

I will of course update you on any progress!

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

I was an Engineer in the industry from 1979 and compelled by closed shop to be a union member - that’s when I first started to see industrial relations as more of a management issue. This was reinforced in 1984 and 1985 when Nissan and Honda established themselves in U.K. I was working for Austin Rover and with Honda from 1986 and joined Nissan in 1991 - there were almost no industrial disputes and Sir Ian Gibson took a much better model to industrial relations (he was ex-Ford)

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

@grandroux_p @OxideTwinjet @johnredwood @cicero6666 Nissan, Toyota and Honda never had issues with Unions. I’m not saying Unions weren’t an issue, but they were mostly a management issue - and yes I was there!

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

@jmurekezi Honda’s TQM was actually pretty largely embraced by the junior and middle management. Had the relationship with Honda endured, probably Rover would have endured - but instead it was sold off under the noses of most of the management team.

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

@ListerLawrence They are great - but that mightn’t be an unbiased opinion!!

[Emmanuel Macron @EmmanuelMacron]

Il y a 10 ans, on nous disait qu’il était impossible de produire des batteries électriques en Europe et que l’automobile française ne ferait pas le poids face à la concurrence mondiale.

Impossible n’est pas Français !

Aujourd’hui nous avons 4 gigafactories en France, nous produisons des centaines de milliers de véhicules électriques et nos R4 et R5 sortent de nos usines avec des batteries fabriquées chez nous.

C’est très concret, c’est bon pour nos emplois, notre économie, et cohérent avec nos objectifs climatiques.

Au Mondial de l’Auto ce matin, j’ai réaffirmé une ambition claire : notre industrie automobile française et européenne innove, accélère et se réindustrialise. Nous devons continuer et aller plus loin.

Trois priorités :

1. Protéger notre industrie.

L’accord engagé entre l’Union européenne et la Chine marque une étape pour lutter contre la concurrence déloyale, notamment sur les véhicules hybrides. Nous voulons une concurrence juste, qui protège nos entreprises et nos emplois.

2. Accélérer l’électrification et la réindustrialisation.

Plus de 40 % des véhicules vendus en septembre étaient électriques. Avec France 2030, nous avons investi dans l’innovation, relancé des filières industrielles et démontré qu’on pouvait créer des emplois tout en décarbonant notre économie. Nous continuerons, notamment avec le véhicule autonome.

3. Renforcer notre souveraineté européenne.

Avec nos partenaires allemands, nous avançons vers un accord pour concilier décarbonation, compétitivité et protection de notre industrie. Avec une priorité : produire en Europe nos véhicules et leurs composants.

Nous avons montré que nous pouvions y arriver. Soyons fiers de nos industries et de nos savoir-faire.

Continuons à décarboner sans désindustrialiser, innover sans dépendre et défendre notre capacité à produire en Europe.

Croyons en nous, en notre industrie et en notre avenir !

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

Every radius on a car being sold globally is Govt regulated. Every car is homologated to the regulations of every country it’s sold in. Did the customers ask for seat belts, airbags, catalyst, headlamp levellers, lane keeping software…….. these are there either by regulation or pseudo-regulation. You can contest the impact but for sure, cars are safer and cleaner every year as a result

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

From @thetimes today. Industry lobby will inevitably win concessions on the timing of the ZEV mandate; however, in compromising on the speed to transition to BEV there is room to clarify the content of the gap between 2030-2035. It should ban new “self charging” hybrids, which are nothing more than an ICE with a battery. The technology for PHEV and REEV is sufficiently advanced to mandate that every car should have a plug and be capable of at least 60 miles of autonomous EV range. Now is the moment to close the loophole in return for slowing the transition to full BEV (but speeding the transition to lower Co2 and clean air) @jreynoldsMP

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

@andrewmckay99uk @Tankslider @thetimes Yeh - not even one mile of EV - really just torque curve fill-in. Amazing in 1997 (I also launched Tino) but not so amazing now

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

@MrJamesMay Yep it’s definitely a candidate - I’m also thinking 1984 Plymouth Voyager should be there! I’m a big fan of Bob Lutz

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

As an auto-industry veteran and “Car Guy”, I’m inevitably drawn to those generation cars that changed the industry; cars which bravely challenged convention and people who took a risk. Cars like Ford Model T (1908, democratising car ownership); Austin Seven (1922, influencing BMW and Datsun); BMC Mini (1959, transverse engine); Lambo Miura (1966, mid-engined supercar); VW Golf Mk1 (1974 defining hatchback); Toyota Prius (1997, scaling electrified powertrains); Nissan Qashqai (2007, crossover); Nissan LEAF (2010, pioneering the modern BEV). There are perhaps other like the Toyota Corolla, the Mercedes S-Class and the RangeRover among others that one could name. There are plenty of attempts that tried and (arguably) failed. The Tucker 48 (1948); Chrysler Turbine (1963); Aston Martin Lagonda (1976); DeLorean DMC-12 (1981); GM EV1 (1996); Renault Avantime (2001); VW Phaeton (2002); BMW I£ (2013); Toyota Mirai (2014); Jaguar I-Pace (2018). While they might not have changed the industry, they added to its learning and its history.

So what? Well I’ve had the honour to be at the centre of some of those generational cars and also cars that have failed to hit the intended target. It takes bravery and vision to cause a change. I remember one industry colleague telling me I’d have been better off throwing the $4B LEAF development budget into the Pacific!

And so I turn to the conversation; polarised love and hate; around the Jaguar 01. One has to take a personal view on style - I’ve seen the car in the flesh and its imposing; one might question the price positioning; the interior practicality; or its commercial prospects. The decision to stop production of Jaguar for two years and prepare for this launch wouldn’t have been my approach, but that doesn’t make it wrong. What the Jaguar 01 is, is brave. That is to be commended and I salute my @JLR_News industry colleagues for it. Whether it becomes a generational car or not, only time will tell; but what is sure, is that has added to the automobile history books in trying to find a new answer to a segment by leveraging an EV architecture. For the sake of this storied brand, I hope it succeeds.

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

@TC_1963 A2 was on my draft list

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

@danidotjpeg David is actually one of the most approachable people

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

@Stuwhitt @LBC Competing is the only sustainable way to survive; innovate or die. Hiding behind a tariff wall just postpones the inevitable.

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

I spoke with @LBC earlier today on whether the U.K. should increase tariffs on Chinese cars.

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

The ZEV mandate (for 2026) doesn’t mandate 33% and this continues to be a point of misinformation

Take Toyota purely as example

Headline target: 33%.

But the rules allow manufacturers to borrow against future targets — worth up to 8.25 percentage points in 2026.

They can also use over-performance against their CO₂ target to generate credits — potentially another 6 points. That particularly benefits manufacturers selling lots of efficient hybrids/PHEVs.

So:

33% headline
− 8.25% borrowing
− 6% CO₂ flexibility
= 18.75%

And there’s also credit trading and other flexibilities.

Hybrids don’t magically become ZEVs. But their lower CO₂ can help offset the ZEV obligation.

So stop pretending the mandate says every manufacturer must sell 33% BEVs in 2026.

It doesn’t. 33% is the headline trajectory, not necessarily the number of EVs an individual manufacturer actually has to sell.

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

This is of course all true as you’d expect from the exemplary authority on car sales. But I would add that there is an R2 0.85 correlation to EV consideration when oil is between $90-100/ barrel. The argument for EV becomes economically compelling and you see this in September sales. Expect the diesel market to disappear and good luck trying to sell a 2nd hand one in part-ex for an EV!

[SMMT @SMMT]

Battery electric vehicle (BEV) demand climbed 36.3% to a record high volume of 99,199 units with market share up five percentage points to 28.3%.

That equates to almost five new BEVs registered every minute – more than double the rate three years ago – as buyers respond to unprecedented model choice, especially in the smaller segments, compelling discounts and government’s Electric Car Grant.

https://t.co/DNYMh01826

[Dr. Andy Palmer @AndyatAuto]

@Seanthepork @faisalislam @Eddystone506 If you’re buying PCP you’re not taking much of a risk. And yes, the products are good. The EV tech (batteries) and software stacks lead the industry, but one could say they lag in perceived quality, design, brand and aftersales