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Humvee maker AM General reportedly for sale, with interest from FCA, GM

WASHINGTON — AM General has put itself up for sale and has hired investment bank Macquarie Group Ltd to seek potential bidders in a deal that could value the builder of Humvee military vehicles at more than $2 billion, people familiar with the matter said this week. Potential bidders include competitors in the military ground vehicle market, such as General Dynamics, Oshkosh Corp and BAE Systems, according to two people familiar with the matter. Automakers like Fiat Chrysler and General Motors may also be potential buyers. GM licensed Hummer from AM General in 1998 to build civilian SUVs. None of the companies would comment or reply to a request for comment. The South Bend, Indiana-based AM General is currently owned by private equity firms. A possible sale of AM General follows a rash of deals over the past 18 months among defense contractors. But relatively fewer makers of defense equipment have gone on the auction block. Last year, United Technologies acquired Rockwell Collins for $30 billion, and in March, TransDigm Group continued its acquisition spree with a $525 million deal for Extant Components Group. AM General could fetch about 10 times its annual earnings of $160 million, one of the people said. The company's favorable tax treatment because of its current status as an limited liability corporation, would allow a buyer to reduce the company's taxable earnings for 15 years. That coupled with recent contract awards could push the ultimate value of the company to over $2 billion in a sale. The sale, should it happen, comes as the U.S. Army is gearing up for a broad effort to modernize its forces, including seeking prototypes of its Next-Generation Combat Vehicle in fiscal year 2022. Last month, AM General was awarded an Army contract for as many as 2,800 new M997A3 High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle (HMMWV) ambulances. The contract could be worth as much as $800 million if all options were exercised, AM General said at the time. Last year, the Pentagon awarded AM General a $550 million contract to deliver HMMWVs for use as protected weapons carriers, cargo transporters and ambulances to Afghanistan, Iraq, Ukraine, Jordan, Slovenia, Bahrain, Columbia, Bosnia and Kenya as a part of a larger Foreign Military Sales agreement. The sale of AM General offers an opportunity to purchase a prime contractor that delivers a finished product to the Pentagon, and not just an add-on system or service.

2022 Rivian R1T vs. 2022 Ford F-150 Lightning vs. GMC Hummer EV Pickup | How they compare on paper

The 2022 Rivian R1T has arrived, ushering in the era of the production electric pickup truck. The Rivian reviews are in, and spoiler alert: They're pretty good. Curious how the new battery-powered truck stacks up to its forthcoming competitors? Well, you've come to the right place. Rivian beat all of Detroit's big automakers to market in the half-ton segment, but probably not by the margin the startup would have liked. Ford's answer is the F-150 Lightning, which is due to enter production early next year, coming hot on the heels of GM's first entry into the space – the GMC Hummer EV pickup – which is scheduled to come off the line late this fall. While all three are pickups, they're aimed at distinctly different buyers, as a perusal of their specifications will reveal. Let's have a look, shall we?   Disclaimer: Before we dive in on this one, we'd like to note that while we've made our best effort to verify the specs provided, the Rivian is brand-new and the others are still in the prototype phase. Some of these figures may be inaccurate or may simply change before production. This is all hypothetical until you can actually cross-shop them anyway, right? Cool. End disclaimer. Let's start with the powertrains. They're all battery-electric trucks engineered on a modular rear-wheel-drive configuration engineered to accommodate (theoretically, anyway) up to four electric drive units. Rivian actually makes the most use of this with a quad-motor setup producing 835 horsepower and 908 pound-feet of torque with its high-output initial model. GMC's three-motor Hummer has the R1T beat with its estimated 1,000-horsepower output, while Ford's (also three-motor) comes in with a far more modest 563 horses. This is an excellent illustration of our above point that these are not all engineered for the same crowd. Ford's F-150, which comes in at a lower price point, is meant to be far more mainstream, as its power output suggests.  This theme continues when we look at the dimensions. Despite the image "Hummer" may conjure, GMC's entry actually needs the shallowest parking space. The Rivian is right behind it, with the work-truck-spec Ford extending more than a foot longer than either. What the Hummer lacks in length, it makes up for in girth. It's the widest by a good 5 inches. The Rivian is only slightly pudgier than the F-150, but it's much closer at that end of the scale.

GMC Hummer EV pickup reveal postponed

We’re pretty excited about the all-electric Hummer pickup coming from the GMC brand. GM is too, enough to spend Super Bowl money on an ad teasing it. Today, we received an update from GM about the Hummer EV, with good news and bad news. The bad news: GM has announced that it is postponing the May 20 reveal for the Hummer. With the coronavirus throwing the proverbial wrench into a number of vehicle operations, including reveals, we canÂ’t say weÂ’re surprised at all. The good news, GM assures us, is that development continues “undeterred.” GM understandably hasnÂ’t provided a new debut date for the GMC Hummer EV, but it did provide us with the new short teaser video above. WeÂ’ve seen other details in previous teasers, as well. We were lucky enough to see the Hummer EV in person last month just before the pandemic began causing the world to grind to a halt. At GMÂ’s EV Day at its Warren, Mich., campus, the Hummer pickupÂ’s exterior was on full display. ItÂ’s a big, off-road-ready pickup complete with giant all-terrain rubber and tow hooks. It features removable roof panels for access to the open sky, which appears to be depicted in the teaser above. It features sail panels behind the C-pillars, similar to those on the Chevy Avalanche and Honda Ridgeline. Its bed was concealed with a tonneau cover, but it sported GMCÂ’s MultiPro tailgate that we first saw on the Sierra Denali. Interior photos showed a spacious interior with blocky shapes, squared hourglass vents that mirror the look of the taillights and a lunar theme that incorporates the topography of the Sea of Tranquility into things like the floor mats and speaker covers. It also has a large infotainment screen as well as a digital instrument panel. The Hummer pickup will be offered with a number of electric powertrain options, the most powerful of which will provide 1,000 horsepower and a 0-60 mph time of less than three seconds. Like the rest of the next generation of GM EVs, it will use the automakerÂ’s new Ultium modular battery and powertrain technology. While we donÂ’t have further details about a potential reveal date, we also know a Hummer electric SUV based on the pickup will follow at some point. It, too was on display at GMÂ’s EV Day. It looks exactly like the Hummer pickup from the rear doors forward, but with a shorter wheelbase and enclosed cargo area in the rear. It also sported a liftgate-mounted spare.