Like many other purchases in the US right now, buying an EV is getting more expensive.

After months of record-breaking battery-materials prices and historic inflation, automakers are passing costs on to consumers. This month, Tesla and GMC announced significant price hikes on EV models. Rivian, Lucid, and GM raised prices on EVs earlier this year.

Zoom in: Several EV manufacturers are now hoping that the federal government will intervene. Ford, GM, Stellantis, and Toyota sent a joint letter to US lawmakers on June 13 asking that Congress lift a cap on a tax credit aimed at incentivizing adoption of zero-emissions vehicles.

The companies cited “recent economic pressures and supply chain constraints” that are driving up EV prices for customers, per Reuters.

• Some automakers are facing commodities costs that could amount to double what they initially forecasted for 2022.

Setbacks on subsidies

Congress passed a $7,500 federal tax credit for EV purchases in 2008. The incentive was meant to help EVs compete with internal combustion engine vehicles and allow manufacturers to reach scale.

For that reason, lawmakers included a cap on the tax credit: After an automaker sells 200,000 EVs, buyers are no longer eligible for the federal financial support.

• GM and Tesla have already hit that limit. Ford and Toyota are likely to reach it later this year.

Recent proposals to increase the EV credit and eliminate the per-automaker cap died with the Build Back Better bill. Now, time could be running out to extend the federal tax credit, if Democrats lose their razor-thin majority in Congress in the November midterm elections. Republicans largely oppose the tax credit.

Big picture: Without additional financial incentives, the US risks falling further behind Europe and Asia when it comes to EV adoption.

By 2025, EVs could make up 39% of new car sales in China and 40%–50% of sales in the UK, Germany, and France, according to BloombergNEF. As of now, EV market share in the US is on track to reach only ~15% by that year.

Read the full story on EV price hikes here.—GD

Chief innovation officers, or CIOs, are increasingly running point on cities’ digital transformation, updating or keeping them on the cutting edge of a fast moving technological world.

The specific responsibilities of the role vary from city-to-city. Some are hyper-focused on rolling out smart-city projects and fostering relationships with local innovators, while others wear not one but two CIO hats: chief innovation officer and chief information officer.

Zoom in: Grace Simrall is chief of civic innovation and technology for the Louisville Metro Government in Louisville, Kentucky, a position she’s held since August 2016.

• Under Simrall’s leadership, the city of nearly 800,000 has pursued private partnerships, including one with Waze’s Connected Citizens Program around traffic management and another with Microsoft to preempt the effects of automation via workforce upskilling and re-skilling.
• Simrall now oversees an agency of over 80 people, up from 69 when she began.

“We view a smart city like we’re building a house. And what I mean by that is, you don’t build a house just to build a house,“ Simrall told us.”Similarly, we’re not doing a smart city just because it sounds cool. It’s really meant to drive better outcomes for our residents. And those outcomes are around economic development. So jobs and family-supporting wage jobs... sustainability, improving public health, improving public safety, improving mobility, transportation.”

We spoke with Simrall to discuss her vision for innovation in the Louisville metro area. Click here to read the full interview.—JM

Stat: Global investment in battery storage is expected to more than double this year to nearly $20 billion, per a new IEA report. Check out our primer on battery storage, if you need a refresher.

Quote: “We were obviously too late for AI, and now, [for quantum computing], we still have the chance to be in time before the technology gets locked in….All this did not happen for AI, and we can see the results around us.”—Mauritz Kop, a Transatlantic Technology Law Forum fellow at Stanford University

Read: Deep learning is a product of The Innovator’s Dilemma.

Peep the stats: The way teams work together has changed. Check out Asana’s U.S. Anatomy of Work Index 2022 to explore how organizations, teams, and individuals can drive clarity and build trust. Download it here.*

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Three of the following news stories are true, and one...we made up. Can you spot the odd one out?

• Leaked emails show Apple will release a smart jewelry line this fall.
• Some residents of a town in California want to shoot down Amazon delivery drones.
• NASA has awarded multiple contracts for developing lunar nuclear reactors.
• Cosmo released its first-ever AI-generated magazine cover.

Our Emerging Tech Brew Summit is creeping closer, so it’s time to highlight some of the amazing speakers we have in store! We’ll be sitting down with Paul Dabrowski about the implications of gene-editing technology, Ramya Swaminathan about revolutionizing the power grid to fight climate change, and Justin Kolbeck about the future of cultivated meats. Don’t miss out on these three and more and join us on September 29 in NYC.

Limited spots available (since we’ll be meeting IRL!), so make sure to secure your place today—you won’t want to miss this!

Catch up on the top Emerging Tech Brew stories from the past few editions:

• This startup wants to decarbonize concrete production by using CO2 as an input
• How AI-based ”nowcasts“ try to parse economic uncertainty
• How Microsoft and Google use AI red teams to “stress test” their system