Bloomberg’s Welch on covering the auto beat

David Welch, the Bloomberg bureau chief in Detroit, spoke with Bianchi Public Relations about his career and his work.

Here is an excerpt:

Can you tell us what types of stories, trends or issues are on your radar now?

The auto industry is in a period of transformation, which is driven by technological change. It’s autonomy, electric drive and different mobility services. We are interested in the horse race of who gets first mover advantage. Tesla has it in electric cars. Alphabet Inc.’s Waymo unit may have it in autonomy but that is less clear. And ride hailing services like Uber and Lyft started ahead, but they may not have the final word in how tomorrow’s transportation works.

Right now, we’re interested in how the technology develops, but more important, how the business case develops for the technology. There is a lot of cash moving into those areas, but none of it is returning cash anytime soon. So, we will see a shakeout, and we will see joint ventures and mergers. This will take some time to play out.

Describe the craziest or most fun story you have written.

Recently, it was a 3,000 word story on the Who’s Winning the Self-Driving Car Race. I spent time with every major company and some minor ones to figure out where they are with testing and plans to put self-driving cars on the road. What’s fun is that the story is really a living, breathing organism on Bloomberg’s Hyperdrive portal. We update as companies do new things in autonomy or as new players enter the scene.

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