Posts by: Eddie Mejia

Potential Partnership: Google and Ford

The future of cars is steering itself towards autonomous technology; surprisingly, it is not an automaker guiding that charge, but Google. The tech titan (not project titan) had a head start on the competition, in that it already had a well documented and extensive on the US automotive infrastructure, and not to mention access to a myriad of satellites. Now, Google is rumored to be trying to (pote

Uber: People Are Ridiculous

Uber has reached a stratospheric level of fame (or some cases infamy); its popularity has catapulted it into verbification. This is separate from genericized trademarks, it is a step above and beyond. People are such staunch supporters of Uber, that they have not only added the term to the public lexicon ridiculously quickly, but made it into a verb even faster. I assume it was the fastest, only

Carl Icahn and the Pep Boys

Pep Boys has been in the midst of a couple of turbulent years. After being the most well known name in the Automotive repairs and part market for decades; it has gone down hill for them this side of the millennia. Manny, Moe And Jack have watched as their empire was overtaken by the likes of Autozone, Advance Auto, O’Reilly and others. In the past five years, almost been bought out twice, once by

Pep Boys Doubles in Stock Value (but not Real Value (yet))

Carl Icahn has been in a bidding war with Bridgestone for a great many months (two of them); regarding the fate of Pep Boys (Manny, Moe and Jack). In October of 2015, Bridgestone proposed to buy Pep Boys for a hefty 15 dollars a share. The Pennsylvania born acquisition target, was trading at only $9.25 per share, a short 5 months (May 19th) before the deal. Today, Pep Boys is trading has ostensibl

The New Hybrid Chevrolet Malibu

Traditionally, hybrid cars have a look to them; as if trying to tell the world “I sacrifice aesthetics for fuel economy,” but lately models (e.g. Toyota Camry, Ford Fusion, and now the Chevrolet Malibu) have been adding optional powertrains. Honda was the first automaker to add a hybrid option to one of their high volume models. Two years after the Toyota Prius was released Honda tried to jump on

Sayonara SideCar

When people think about ride sourcing they do not think of SideCar. Most people do not even know what it is. Those people would be surprised to know, that the aforementioned company is directly responsible for the rise of ride hailing services. Sadly, innovation does not beget success in this day and age, persistent glorified panhandling with a pitch does. Uber and Lyft are unicorns (the Forbes’ U

Local Love Stops Traffic

Houston is one of the largest cities in the United States, and has one of the best highways (and I would argue Infrastructures) in the world. I-10 crossing Beltway 8 is 26 lanes wide. This includes 2 tollway/high occupancy vehicle lanes, 4 regular flow lanes, 3 exiting/merging lanes, and 4 feeder lanes (6 if you include the right turn only lane and the U-turn lane)... on each side. Yet seven days

Driving the Hackermobile... Right Through Musk's Ego

By now, Elon Musk is a household name. Tesla Motors and SpaceX are such prominent entities, that it would be harder to avoid the constant stream of news originating from them than not know what they are. Musk is so famous, that the Hackermobile (coining credit pending) built by George Hotz has become well known through its documented (figurative) punching the embodiment of Musk’s Ego right in the

Audi e-tron Evolution

Hybrid technology picked up steam (or took charge) in the 70s during the oil crisis. It was not widely implemented, but it was heavily researched. The first major company with a feasible evolved electric hybrid was actually Audi in 1989 with their 100 Avant based Duo, but it was scrapped duo to the excessive weight of the batteries. Then came the Prius. It was the first hybrid that made no major

Audi Charges Ahead

Some may or may not know, Audi had a part in the Volkswagen Diesel scandal of 2015. Their entry level A3 diesel had the four cylinder diesel at the heart of the scandal. However, Ingolstadt based marvel maker is (or should be) more well known for their e-tron series. While I’m sure the e-tron series has been tinkered with for well over a decade now, the first (concept) model was not unveiled