FORT WORTH, TX—LG Electronics has opened its first U.S. factory here to assemble charging stations for electric vehicles. 

BOWLING GREEN, KY—The first E-Ray Corvettes have rolled off the assembly line at the Corvette Assembly Plant in Bowling Green, Kentucky. 

PRATTVILLE, AL—Tier 1 supplier Hyundai Transys has deployed autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) from Thira Robotics at its automotive seating assembly plant here. It marks the first time that a U.S. assembly plant has deployed Thira AMRs.

PEACHTREE CITY, GA—A German drug packaging and medical device manufacturer is investing $88 million to build a new assembly plant here and hire more than 200 new employees.

LAKE FOREST, CA—Staar Surgical, a manufacturer of implantable lenses used in ophthalmic surgery, has inaugurated a 1.1 megawatt solar energy microgrid at its production facility here. The system was installed to reduce energy costs, improve sustainability, and safeguard production in the event of grid outages caused by extreme weather events.

CAMBRIDGE, MA—A multimodal system uses models trained on language, vision and action data to help robots develop and execute plans for household, construction and manufacturing tasks.

AUSTIN, TX— In 2022, the Elon Musk-led automaker reported annual deliveries of 1.31 million and production of 1.37 million electric vehicles. The new numbers represent delivery growth of 38% year over year and production growth of 35% year over year. In 2022, the company reported 40% growth year over year in deliveries from 2021.
In its last earnings call in October 2023, Tesla execs offered guidance that the company would notch at least 1.8 million deliveries for the full year, a number they had revised down from a 2 million goal earlier.

PORTLAND, OR— Until the invention of the Phillips screw, American assembly lines, craftsmen, and consumers used regular, slotted-head screws. But that design was problematic for three reasons: it was difficult to align the driver with the screw aperture; the driver tended to slip from the open ends; and the slot required a closely matching bit. The cruciform drive addressed those problems. 

ARMAGH, PA—The fire that consumed the Roadster Factory's 48,000 square-foot warehouse burned for more than a dozen hours and required around 100 firefighters from 13 local fire departments.

AMSTERDAM—Stellantis has agreed to partner with EV start-up Ample Inc. to integrate Ample’s modular battery swapping technology into Stellantis’ electric vehicles.