+++ An AUDI R8 successor is being readied for a mid-decade launch, which will reinvent the marque’s famous halo model while also helping to reposition the brand as an electric forerunner. According to insiders, the supercar has not yet been officially signed off but is very much underway. It won’t be called the R8 and will take an entirely new design direction so it won’t resemble the long-standing model. However, it will stay true to a pure sports car concept, with 2 doors and more power than anything else in the Audi range, albeit coming from an electric set-up. The current R8 remains in production and a run-out model, expected to be a RWD GT, will be revealed later this year before all variants of the car stop being made at the end of 2023. Talking about that specific model, Audi Sport boss Sebastian Grams said: “What we are trying to do is get as close as we can to that ultimate feeling of racing”. He added that 60% of its parts are similar to GT3-spec cars. The R8 is made alongside the Audi e-Tron GT and RS e-Tron GT at the Audi Sport factory in Böllinger Höfe, considered at the forefront of Audi’s innovative production techniques so the facility is already geared up to produce high-end electric models. While Audi Sport expedites development of the R8 successor, the team responsible for primarily hand-building the R8 will stay on at the factory after R8 production ends, allowing Audi to ramp up e-Tron GT production. However, it also means they will be trained and ready to start building the R8 successor within a couple of years, because Audi is keen for hand-built elements to remain a feature of a new flagship sports car to reflect its position in the line-up and justify its expense. Grams said: “Absolutely we will keep craftsmanship as it’s what makes the car unique from the rest of the portfolio. If we bring an R8 successor, we will try to continue to do that. It is important for the customer. There’s love inside an R8”. Audi has a plethora of platform options for an R8 successor, although it’s most likely to use one developed with Porsche, given the firm’s sports car expertise. The SSP Sport platform, recently confirmed by Porsche, will be used on SUVs and saloons and replace the J1 platform currently used for the Porsche Taycan and Audi e-Tron GT sibling cars. It’s one option for an R8 successor, depending on its ability to scale down. However, there’s another possible basis for a next-generation R8: the sports car platform Porsche is readying for its upcoming electric Porsche 718 Boxster and Porsche Cayman. Notably, this architecture aims to mimic the current 718 duo’s mid-engined handling characteristics by stacking the batteries vertically behind the seats for a low centre of gravity and optimum weight distribution, and it could serve a similar purpose for an electric successor to today’s mid-engined R8. The platform of choice also depends on whether Audi Sport wants to persevere with a mid-engined R8 successor to emulate the outgoing model. However, Grams said this is not the philosophy of Audi Sport: “We see every project as its own. Otherwise we wouldn’t be so successful”. On the topic of platforms, Grams said: “We have brands around the Volkswagen Group which can be synergised. Despite being on the same platform, e-Tron GT is very unique from Taycan. “If you look at Audi Sport sales, we sold nearly 40.000 cars last year, which shows that our customers are hot on our products. Therefore, we have the freedom needed to make great products. And that means we should be involved in platform development as early as possible”. Audi Sport has already shown its electric sporting capability with the RS e-Tron GT, which sprints from 0-100 kph in 3.3 seconds and delivers 598 hp, as well as having 472 km of range and rapid charging capability. A future R8 will need to exceed these figures, as well as having sufficient power and range for track driving, which is likely to mean the inclusion of higher-density batteries in its set-up. Grams said: “We have already proven that it is possible to generate RS love in an electric model. If you look at the e-Tron GT, 60% of sales are RS. “We want to make the car different, like we do in the combustion-engined world. Our customers want to differentiate from other models: in design, bodywork, chassis and performance. With the RS e-tron GT, we are the electric forerunner in a field of competitors”. +++
+++ BMW is busy working on its next-generation electric vehicles, which will begin arriving in the middle of the decade. Part of what the automaker calls Neue Klasse (New Class; a new platform and a family of new technologies) are new batteries that are going to offer up to 30 percent more range compared to BMW’s today models. We’ll talk about the numbers in a minute but first, let’s see the company’s new battery tech. For the Neue Klasse, BMW will introduce its 6th generation electric drive technologies, which will use new batteries. The Bavarian manufacturer will fundamentally redesign the cell format and cell chemistry of its batteries switching to round cells designed especially for use in vehicles based on the Neue Klasse architecture. These new round cells will replace the prismatic cells BMW is currently using. Taking a deeper look into the design of the new battery cells, the company says they will have a diameter of 46 millimetres and 2 different available heights depending on their application. The cell chemistry will include more nickel content on the cathode side, while the cobalt content will be reduced. On the anode side, in turn, the silicon content will be increased and this new chemistry will result in more than 20 percent higher volumetric energy density. Among other changes, Neue Klasse will also introduce an 800 volt electrical system, further optimising how the energy is supplied to DC fast charging stations. BMW promises this will reduce the charging times from 10 to 80 percent by approximately 30 percent. Speaking of charging, it’s also worth mentioning that the firm also promises 30 percent more range thanks to the new batteries in its range-topping vehicles. Also, and that’s perhaps far more important, the automaker estimates that battery price will be reduced by up to 50 percent compared to the current fifth-generation batteries. To secure the production of batteries needed for the Neue Klasse-based vehicles, BMW will open new battery plants in Europe and China with a projected total annual capacity of up to 20 GWh. Two more cell plants will be built in North America but there are no partners nominated yet. +++
+++ The BMW XM is entering production toward the end of the year, so we know that the stand-alone M performance SUV will debut sooner rather than later. Apparently, the launch is happening this month: on September 27, which is a few weeks away at the time of this writing. Details of the launch have yet to surface, but we’ll surely get a whiff in the weeks to come. A teaser of the XM is already out on the company’s consumer website. The XM is a plug-in hybrid powered by a new 4.4-litre twin-turbocharged S68 V8 engine paired with an electric motor. The XM Concept, which previewed the model’s design, had this setup rated at 750 hp, but I’ve learned that the production version will make just 650 hp and 870 Nm. A hotter version will arrive after the regular XM, which could churn out up to 1.000 Nm of twists. This powertrain setup is connected to a ZF 8-speed automatic transmission. The PHEV should be able to run on pure electricity up to 80 km. If the rumour of the September debut holds true, we’ll likely see the XM in production form soon and confirm all the information about the standalone M model; the first of which since the venerable M1 coupe. +++
+++ If you’ve ever owned a supercar with serious engine or gearbox troubles, you’ll know that REPAIR BILLS can run into tens of thousands of euros. The McLaren MP4-12C and Lamborghini’s Aventador and Gallardo are just three examples of models that have in the recent past sometimes gone horribly wrong, then cost a fortune to put right. So who’s naming names here in an effort to warn the public of the cars that are among the costliest to put right? Only Warrantywise, which knows a thing or two about the subject matter, because the nature of its business means it often picks up the tab for such eye-wateringly expensive garage bills. But it’s not just ageing supercars that have gained an unenviable reputation for costing €20.000 or more to fix after their manufacturer warranties expire and faults develop. At least one British premium model is accused of doing the same. “The previous-generation Range Rover is named as the least-reliable used car in our annual reliability index”, stated Warrantywise, whose definition of used in this case is a car that’s anything up to 10 years old. “This model rates lowest due to the frequency and cost of repairs”. In its ‘Highest Repair Cost’ table, the used car warranty firm placed the Range Rover in the No.1 slot, thanks to one car’s shockingly high, Warrantywise-supplied workshop bill of €23,890. And just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse, the figure for a Range Rover Sport covered by Warrantywise was almost as heinously high, at €22.358. Other cars exposed in Warrantywise’s league table of the 10 least reliable models covered by the firm are the BMW M3 (with a ‘Highest Repair Cost’ of €12,115), Porsche Panamera (€10,785), BMW M5 (€10,129), BMW X6 (€9,613), Audi Q7 (€8,719), Porsche Cayenne (€6,360), Bentley Continental GT (€6,227) and Mazda CX-5 (€5,777). Or, to put it another way, of the vehicles found guilty by the warranty firm of being the costliest to fix in Britain, eight are German or British premium models, one is a humble family car from Japan and the remaining offering (the Bentley) is a luxury product with a price tag to match. And in this league of shame it’s undoubtedly the Range Rover and Range Rover Sport that are the biggest individual losers thanks to inexplicably huge repair costs that are massively higher than those of rival premium firms from Germany. On a happier note, Jaguar is (thankfully) conspicuous by its absence from this list. That could be down to Warrantywise having fewer Jags on its books, but the evidence suggests that Land Rover’s issues aren’t plaguing the other side of the JLR divide. What conclusions can we draw from the fact that the majority of the cars in Warrantywise’s top 10 are ‘premium’ German products? Maybe it’s that other, once lesser, manufacturers from mainland Europe, Asia and North America have massively raised their game. Yet at around the same time it perhaps feels like a Dieselgate-damaged Germany has almost stood still, or maybe even gone backwards. +++
+++ RIVIAN just added almost $3 billion to its market capitalization in a day, and all it took was a fairly bare-bones deal with a new frenemy. The upstart and Mercedes-Benz will join forces to build big electric vans in Europe “in a few years,” the 2 companies revealed, sending Rivian shares soaring 11%, their biggest jump in four months. Thin as the announcement was on detail, it sent an obvious signal. Yes, this young plug-in pickup maker is having trouble ramping up production, but one of the most storied manufacturers in the world still sees real potential. A friendship with a competitor is nothing new for Rivian. One of the reasons investors were so high on the company when it was preparing to go public a year ago was the way General Motors and Ford raced one another to strike a strategic partnership with the up-and-comer around the time it was in the process of securing major backing from Amazon. One of Ford’s senior-most executives at the time later bragged about “stealing” a promising investment from its Detroit-based nemesis at the 11th hour. There’s another “blast from the past” element to this from Mercedes’s perspective, as Baird analyst Ben Kallo put it in a note to clients Friday. Daimler played a critical role in helping Tesla get off the ground by acquiring a stake during the great financial crisis and buying drivetrains from the company to power Mercedes hatchbacks. Elon Musk has described that deal as fundamental to Tesla surviving its early struggles. There’s a lot left to unpack about this new tie-up: how and why it came together, what it means and who wins and loses. Here are a few thoughts and questions to ponder: 1) Conserving cash: In the months before and after its blockbuster initial public offering in November, Rivian was furiously hiring and building out its sales and service operations to support its growth ambitions. Those have been held up by the company’s plant in Normal, Illinois, which isn’t assembling nearly as many R1T pick-up, R1S SUV and Amazon delivery vehicles as hoped. Supply chain woes are plaguing all of the auto industry but hitting inexperienced companies particularly hard. While Rivian still had $15.5 billion in the bank at the end of June, management has made several moves lately to be more capital-efficient amid rising costs and concern about a global downturn. The joint venture with Mercedes will be a cheaper way to enter the European market and boost the company’s credibility with suppliers and prospective customers that might otherwise have been skittish. A lot of Rivian’s cash is also already earmarked for other expensive projects. It has yet to break ground on a $5 billion factory near Atlanta, and executives have said the amount the company has on hand offers just enough runway to get to the start of production of the mid-price car to be built at that plant by 2025. Burden-sharing with Mercedes may also reflect how difficult it’s become for companies in the EV sector to raise capital, D.A. Davidson analyst Michael Shlisky wrote in an email. In a July memo to staff about cutting 6% of Rivian’s workforce, CEO RJ Scaringe noted that global capital markets were tightening. “We need to be able to continue to grow and scale without additional financing in this macro environment”, he wrote. 2) Ford ties: After Ford worked so hard years ago to beat GM to the punch in linking up with Rivian, their relationship has taken many curious twists and turns. First, Joe Hinrichs, the former Ford president who played a leading role in brokering the partnership, abruptly retired and left Rivian’s board. Soon thereafter, the companies called off plans that had been announced 3 months earlier to jointly develop Lincoln’s first fully electric model. Alexandra Ford English, the great-great granddaughter of founder Henry Ford, replaced Hinrichs as a Rivian director, but didn’t stay on for long. Yet another replacement stepped down leading up to Rivian’s IPO, leaving Ford without a board seat. Ford and Rivian have been relatively mum about their future together. Now the former, which still owns a 9.6% stake in the latter, may end up with more formidable competition in the commercial vehicle business that is a huge point of pride and emphasis for Ford CEO Jim Farley. The automaker announced plans just this week to start selling the electric version of its best-selling European delivery van, the E-Transit Custom, roughly a year from now. 3) Upside for Amazon: What Rivian, Mercedes and Ford all have in common is Amazon. The e-commerce giant has a contract with Rivian for 100.000 electric vans due to be delivered by the end of the decade. It also buys vans from Ford, Mercedes and others. Given the size of Amazon’s global fleet and its ambitious sustainability targets, it has to look beyond just Rivian for electric last-mile delivery options. Amazon has exclusive rights to Rivian’s delivery vehicles for 4 years after receiving its first one, as well as the right of first refusal to buy its vans for 2 years after that. It’s surely hoping the Rivian-Mercedes deal will mean more electric van availability, and ideally at lower costs. 5) Carry on: Rivian seeking to establish production in Europe is not a surprise: Executives have had their eye on the market for some time. The company scouted locations for a potential factory in locations including the UK, Germany and Hungary, people familiar with the matter told Bloomberg in February last year. Rivian opting to set up shop with Mercedes somewhere in central or eastern Europe will be a letdown to those who courted the company. In one indication of just how eager leaders were to land the investment, then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson tried to woo Scaringe himself, Sky News reported late last year. +++
+++ Vietnamese carmaker VINFAST on Saturday began handing its first batch of 100 all-electric SUVs to local customers, with U.S. deliveries of the vehicle due to begin as soon as December. VinFast, which began operations in 2019, is gearing up to expand in the U.S. market, where it hopes to compete with legacy automakers and startups with its two all-electric SUVs, the VF8 and VF9, including battery leasing to reduce the purchase price. “The first batch of 5.000 VF8 units will be for U.S. and North American markets. Mass production will start from next week”, VinFast’s global chief executive Le Thi Thu Thuy told on the sidelines of a delivery ceremony at its plant in Vietnam’s northern province of Haiphong. VinFast, part of Vingroup JSC, will start shipping cars overseas in November and customers will have cars delivered as soon as December, Thuy said. The company has registered almost 65.000 reservations globally, and it expects to sell 750.000 EVs per year by 2026, starting with the VF8 and VF9 all-electric SUVs. In March, VinFast said it would build a production plant in North Carolina with an initial projected capacity of 150.000 EVs a year. It tapped banks in July to raise least $4 billion in funding for the project. Nguyen Khac Chung was among the first local customers to have their cars delivered at Saturday’s event. “I thought I had to wait until November to get my car delivered but I was surprised that the waiting time was cut short”, said Chung, who ordered his EV in January, just 2 months after the model was introduced. “Battery leasing is an advantage for customers”, he added. “Why should we buy battery?” The VF8 and VF9 vehicles will start at $42.200 and $57.500 respectively for U.S. customers, excluding the cost to lease the electric battery. From September, the company will also offer customers options that include batteries. +++
+++ The unconventionally shaped successor to the hugely popular VOLVO XC90 will be revealed in the final quarter of 2022, Volvo bosses have confirmed. The new SUV flagship, as the marque’s first totally bespoke EV and the first atop a new platform, will play a fundamental role its goal to sell 600.000 pure-electric cars annually from 2025. Volvo CEO Jim Rowan said: “It’s a very exciting time for us because it takes us into another sphere. It’s another building block towards the future. That model itself is an extremely important vehicle for us”. A brand spokesman added: “Defined by software, it’s a demonstration of our future and marks the start of a new era for safety, and the company”. Following Volvo’s earlier confirmation that the new arrival will take a name, rather than an alphanumeric designation into production, a recent filing suggests it will be called the Embla. The manufacturer filed a trademark application for the name with the European Union Intellectual Property Office late last year. A Volvo spokesperson refused to confirm the brand’s intentions for the nameplate, but with the model’s reveal date approaching and given that ex-Volvo boss Håkan Samuelsson already confirmed its name will start with a vowel, it seems a likely outcome. Embla was the name of the first woman in Norse mythology, which could signal a naming strategy for future models centred around Volvo’s Scandinavian heritage. And before its unveiling later this year, Rowan will showcase the car’s innovative new tech at an event on 21 September. This tech, which includes next-generation safety features, will come as standard on the flagship SUV, and previews what will be available for other future Volvos. A production-ready version of the bold Concept Recharge shown in 2021, the new arrival will provide Volvo with a long-awaited entry into the increasingly important full-sized electric SUV segment, into which most premium-oriented manufacturers have launched their debut EVs in recent years. Volvo’s existing pure EVs, the XC40 Recharge and coupé-backed C40 Recharge, sit a segment lower and use the same CMA platform as the conventionally fuelled XC40. Meanwhile, the XC90 successor will use Volvo’s new SPA2 platform. This evolved version of the current car’s architecture will accommodate a choice of combustion and pure-electric powertrains. It will be the first production car to use the new underpinnings before they are rolled out to other Volvo models and sibling brands owned by parent company Geely Auto. As part of a new platform-sharing agreement, Geely will in turn offer Volvo access to its latest SEA architecture. The Concept Recharge heavily hinted at how Volvo will ensure its new flagship EV retains the XC90’s core characteristics while ushering in a totally new approach to exterior and cabin design, as well as a host of advanced new technologies. The Swedish brand’s biggest model remains a consistently strong seller, even as the current, second-generation car enters its seventh and final year on sale. In the first 10 months of 2021 alone, the XC90 accounted for around 6.5% of Volvo’s global sales, putting it third only to its XC60 and XC40 SUV siblings. So although the XC90 successor will adopt a radically different design, it will continue to major on space and practicality. The ‘less is more’ approach exhibited by the concept points to an enhanced focus on minimalistic design in Volvo’s new electric era, as well as a drive to minimise the well-to-wheel environmental impact of each vehicle it produces. Unlike the vast majority of mixed-powertrain platforms currently on the market, the SPA2 will be offered in 2 distinct forms. This will allow the electric XC90 successor to benefit from a completely flat floor, shortened overhangs and a more overtly cab forward stance, whereas the combustion-engined versions will have slightly more familiar interior proportions, given the need to accommodate an engine, transmission and exhaust system. Some of the concept’s more outlandish and futuristic cues will be toned down for production. The 4 free-standing seats, for example. However, the skateboard-style architecture will offer new levels of interior space and flexibility, which concept designer Robin Page likened to a “Scandinavian living room feeling”. To that end, the production car will ditch physical controls for a cleaner and simpler driver environment. Most of the functions will be controlled through a large-format central touchscreen using operating software developed by Google, as first adopted by the XC40 Recharge and Polestar 2. However, Volvo’s next SUV will not be so easily categorised as an SUV because, although it sits high off the ground and emphasises all-round visibility like the current car, it has a straighter-edged 2-box silhouette reminiscent of estate cars such as the 240, 940 and V70, which once ranked among the Swedish marque’s most important and best-selling models. Company boss Håkan Samuelsson recently told that Volvo will gradually downsize its conventional estate offering (currently comprising various forms of the V60 and V90) in recognition of the simple fact that “people really are fond of high seating positions”. The XC90 successor will therefore straddle the boundary between two segments to capitalise on the popularity of SUVs while differentiating itself from rivals and avoiding alienating buyers of lower-slung models. Page called it “a new type of vehicle”, which “displays new and modern proportions that go hand in hand with increased versatility”, hinting at the potential for other Volvo models to follow suit in blending design cues from different segments. Volvo remains guarded about details of the new car’s powertrain offering, but the firm’s well-publicised push to reduce emissions across its line-up means all combustion variants will feature some form of electrification, be they mild hybrids or plug-in hybrids. Diesel will not be offered at all. It remains an option on certain Volvo models but will be phased out entirely as the brand’s line-up is refreshed. The electric variant, meanwhile, could usher in entirely new powertrain setups distinct from those offered on the CMA-based XC40, C40 and Polestar 2, while 4-wheeldrive is highly likely to be standard, given its large SUV billing. Volvo will offer a choice of battery sizes on its new EVs, giving buyers the option of standard and long-range versions, the latter capable of travelling up to 500 km between charges. +++