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Volvo’s Polestar and Volkswagen Unveil New Rivals for Tesla

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If you’re an auto industry bigwig, you’re spending the week in calm, chocolate-gobbling, yodeling Switzerland. But despite its surroundings, there’s nothing restrained about the Geneva Motor Show. The annual gathering is the venue of choice for supercar manufacturers, and so Europe’s bastion of neutrality becomes a battleground where horsepower, luxury features, and dramatic styling win out.

The Polestar 1 GT fits in at the supercar-stuffed Geneva Motor Show, with 600 horsepower, and 737 pound-feet of torque.

Among this year’s first-timers is Polestar, the brand Volvo created last year to focus on electric performance. To make its mark, the company—formerly dedicated to gasoline-powered track cars—entered the fray with the Polestar 1 GT, announcing it will start taking $3,000 deposits for the coupe next week. The funny thing about this car? It’s a hybrid.

Now, “hybrid” needs redefining in an era where electric cars are setting acceleration records. You may associate the h-word with Toyota’s Prius, with great mileage but lackluster performance. Remember, however, that hybrid just means a blend of drivetrain technologies—and some blended drinks are stronger than others. In a room full of flexing Ferraris and posing Porsches, the Polestar is no weakling, packing 600 horsepower and 737 pound-feet of torque.

The Polestar uses a conventional internal combustion engine to drive the front wheels, and electric motors at the back. Like the Chevrolet Volt, a driver can run on electric power only (in this case, for 90-odd miles from a 34-kWh battery), then use the gas engine to go farther. Unlike in the Volt, the driver can also stamp on the accelerator to kick both drivetrains into action, unleashing the 325 horsepower of the gas engine, and the full performance promise from the car.

“We’re not creating some nice little hybrid, but a hybrid that’s going to be great to drive, and very much in the supercar bracket,” says Polestar’s chief operations officer, Jonathan Goodman.

The car’s styling doesn’t stray far from the popular “muscular box” look of recent Volvos, with dramatic LED lights front and rear and a large grille. Lightweight carbon fiber body panels and the heavy battery under the floor keeps the center of gravity low, promising sharp cornering. Goodman believes this car will appeal to the folks now driving Porsche Panameras and Audi A7s—grand tourer fans, who like long, fun drives, and don’t much feel like getting stranded with a dead battery. But Polestar is committing to fully electric cars from this vehicle forwards, once charging infrastructure has caught up.

In doing so, it’ll be pitting itself not just against Elon Musk’s Tesla, the old man in this game, but against new electric entries. Porsche just announced it will be a fast charging network across the US to support its Mission E. Volkswagen used the Geneva show to tease its ID Vizzion concept luxury sedan, to join its ID Crozz SUV and ID Buzz bus. And Jaguar just made things personal by posting videos of its new I-Pace electric SUV beating a Tesla Model X in a 0-60 mph sprint.

Meanwhile, Tesla is still struggling to produce its affordable Model 3 in large numbers, to satisfy the new, pent-up, demand for electrics—demand it can take some credit for creating. Like Tesla, which sells cars online, direct, Polestar is going to try to update and simplify the car ownership experience. It says it’ll offer the Polestar 1 as a subscription—a kind of lease on steroids, with insurance and maintenance included, as well as pick-up and drop-off servicing to remove the need to ever visit a dealer. It hasn’t said anything about pricing just yet, for either the subscription or outright purchase, but expect six figures.

Polestar is building a new factory in Chengdu, China, but doesn’t expect to have the level of teething-troubles that Tesla is seeing. “This will be the fourth new Volvo managed plant that’s come online in the last three years,” says Goodman. Translated: We got this. Polestar is starting small, with a production target of just 500 per year in 2019, versus Tesla’s 500,000. Although Goodman leaves himself some wiggle room, saying that could be adjusted upwards if demand from buyers is there. Something he’ll find out soon enough, when people who see the car in Geneva get to vote with their own money.


Neutral doesn’t mean boring

 

Image: © РИА Новости, Сергей Белоусов

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