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EVs may put Mercedes, Porsche, Rolls Royce out of business


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https://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/a38090275/biggest-threat-from-electric-cars/

"Electric Cars Could Represent an Existential Threat for Luxury and Performance Brands
Every company seems jazzed about the electric future. Think hard about market forces, though, and it’s obvious that someone is going to lose.

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How do you justify this many high-end car brands when every electric powertrain feels fundamentally the same?

A question like that could kill a brand. Yet wandering the halls of the electric-oriented Munich auto show, you won’t find answers. You won’t even find anyone acknowledging the question. Here, the future is brilliant, boundless, and secure. Every brand is uniquely capable of winning. Every car is uniquely suited to its electric mission. And every executive can recite from memory the story of what will surely happen over the next decade. Getting out of one electric car demonstration drive and into another, though, I was unconvinced. Everyone cannot win. And the nature of electric cars likely means there can be fewer winners in the future.

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Evidence in favor surfaced in the Hyundai Ioniq 5. The electric crossover looks like an upsized Eighties hot hatch adapted for Cyberpunk, with an interior that could shame many concept cars. On the country lanes circling metro Munich, the Ioniq was brilliant. Its cabin was Cadillac quiet, its powertrain Rolls-Royce refined. Even in a lineup filled with all-stars, the Ioniq 5 is special.

To deem the Hyundai as good as Mercedes’s flagship EQS electric mega-sedan would be an overstatement, of course. Going from the Hyundai to the Benz, there’s a palpable step-up, not just inside, but in the overall experience of the car. But it’s a gap that’s not quite big enough to keep sweat off the suits in Stuttgart. The Ioniq 5 might not be the match of the EQS, but it’s a hell of a lot closer than any middling Hyundai has ever been to the luxury stalwart, the Mercedes S-class.

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One core competency that unites the most conventionally successful premium brands is their mastery of the internal-combustion engine. McLaren and Porsche offer not just power but power that’s immediate and unending. Power with thunderous V-8 or wailing flat-six acoustic accompaniment. Rolls-Royce and Bentley, meanwhile, trade not only in suede and solidity, but smoothness and silence.

As the industry shifts toward electric propulsion, these companies will inevitably continue to offer plenty of power, effortless acceleration, and total tranquility. Trouble is, so will Hyundai. So when whatever’s on the lot for $299 a month can get off the line without hesitation in its powertrain or vibrations through its seat rails, it’s hard to imagine how much more will the market bear for the driving experience of a Rolls-Royce.

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Surely names like Rolls-Royce and Mercedes stand for more than just engine refinement. Luxury brands have long differentiated themselves with stunning interiors, next-gen technology, seamless sales and service procedures, and exclusivity. But anyone with a cursory understanding of economics knows that the fewer differentiating factors there are to compete on, the tighter the margins will be in any market. This is why the endless variations of apples drive strong profits (have you seen what Honeycrisps go for?), while the genetic clone that is the common banana can be picked up for pennies.

Electric motors are closer to the latter than the former. Every electric motor good enough to land in a current production car is torquey and linear. Some are permanent magnet, some are synchronous, but you’d never feel the difference if you weren’t told. EV powertrains can compete on how long they can draw from their batteries before they die, how efficient they are, or how well they’re tuned. Yet the fundamental experience is the same.

Asked about how they’ll address this, different premium brands offer different not entirely satisfying answers. AMG says it’ll differentiate itself on tuning. BMW points to its in-house motors as a source of pride. Rolls-Royce ignores the email. Others have more to say in informal chats, but every major OEM stops short of admitting that someone’s going to get hurt. Because if you, as an automaker, acknowledge the obvious conclusion to the question, you may be expected to come up with a solution. No one seems close.

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It doesn’t take a trip to Munich to see it. Wander around any urban center and you won’t find it swarmed with I-Paces or e-trons. All you’ll see are gas cars and Teslas. It took an upstart to recognize that you didn’t need intricate interiors and unquestionable quality to stake a claim in the premium space. The EV experience was luxurious enough; all it took was that and a big touchscreen to convince the world that the brand selling the world’s simplest interiors was worthy of the luxury moniker. Less than a decade later, Tesla is the only EV that matters. For now, at least. It is all but impossible to build a successful business these days on sedans, unless of course the sedans have “Tesla” on the steering apparatus. The brand is so profoundly captivating that market trends seemingly do not apply. As the electric offerings from competitors improve, the homogeneity of the EV experience will threaten Tesla too. But its status as the default EV brand gives it some time to settle the matter.

Those are the spoils of being the first company to understand the immense opportunity afforded by the switch to electric cars. Tesla hasn’t had to face the fundamental question here because it owns the space. In their rush to catch up, though, traditional automakers have become blind to the brewing threat of that very same transition. If they want to endure, they’ll have to find more unique, enduring visions beyond making their current cars electric. Otherwise, I’m not sure that the utopian vision from the auto show stands a chance at coming true."

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While I don't think these highly-established marques are going to die off just like that, I do foresee them either forming ever-larger alliances (Stellantis, Nissan-Renault, etc.) or being bought up by tech giants (Google, Amazon, etc.).

In the former case, this would be necessary to cut costs through platform and technology sharing, since they have traditionally focused on manufacturing and therefore lack the technical expertise required to build their own algorithms. They'll therefore need to hire or poach talent from the software industry moving forward. For the latter, these tech giants have the capital and existing code to produce great software, but they lack the production efficiencies traditional carmakers have perfected over a century. Once they acquire the factory lines of these carmakers, they'll definitely be a force to be reckoned with as everything becomes increasingly digitised.

I'm no expert, but this is the only plausible way I see it happening in the future; it's some uncertain times ahead, and I quietly mourn the loss of the internal combustion engine. 😢 Let me know if you agree or disagree with me! [gossip]

 

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Won't be surprise. The term luxury was used to be defined by quiet cabin, comfort and great ride, and of course the smoothness of the engine (V8, V12). All of which now can be even easily achieved by electric motor. 

Human progress have come to a "peak" point where, what can be define as the new "luxury"? Autonomous driving? Flying car? Voice recognition? Auto this and that? Big and bigger screens? All of which, before technologies were not so advance like today, were pretty much a huge margin between normal cars and luxury cars. 

Guess in future, there aren't many great things to look forward to in the automotive world as compared to those before 2000s. Just felt that cars of this era, are too similar and characterless. 

Edited by Heartbreakid
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4 hours ago, Beanoyip said:

All comes down to branding.. knowing Sinkies they will still choose Tesla over NIO or BYD...

the behaviour is shaped due to the fking COE, ARF and VES

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9 hours ago, Heartbreakid said:

Won't be surprise. The term luxury was used to be defined by quiet cabin, comfort and great ride, and of course the smoothness of the engine (V8, V12). All of which now can be even easily achieved by electric motor. 

Human progress have come to a "peak" point where, what can be define as the new "luxury"? Autonomous driving? Flying car? Voice recognition? Auto this and that? Big and bigger screens? All of which, before technologies were not so advance like today, were pretty much a huge margin between normal cars and luxury cars. 

Guess in future, there aren't many great things to look forward to in the automotive world as compared to those before 2000s. Just felt that cars of this era, are too similar and characterless. 

Exactly. Just like the humble mobile phone these days. We have progress to having HW all the same. Differentiated only by SW and APPs. 
 

quite looking forward to an EV. Less crap to break. For a daily transport, I would like as reliable as possible. Might keep a combustion engine as a classic plate for fun and enjoyment. 

Edited by Mkl22
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5 hours ago, Beanoyip said:

All comes down to branding.. knowing Sinkies they will still choose Tesla over NIO or BYD...

Disagree. Tesla is Apple. NIO and BYD is xiaomi or Oppo. 

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57 minutes ago, Mkl22 said:

Disagree. Tesla is Apple. NIO and BYD is xiaomi or Oppo. 

Merc is Nokia?

I think for cars, the badge will always matter. As long as Merc continue to be 400k a piece, towkay will still buy

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1 hour ago, t0y0ta said:

Merc is Nokia?

I think for cars, the badge will always matter. As long as Merc continue to be 400k a piece, towkay will still buy

Let’s see. Never say never. 
our generation vs the new gen, mindset is vastly different 

Edited by Mkl22
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While performances is not everything, the new Mercedes EQE's century sprint is just 5-6s (need to pay a lot more for dual motor's AMG) when a Tesla Model 3 with its dual motor cost a lot less and is much faster.

Maybe luxury in this context means slow too. Towkays don't like jerky ride?  😂😂😂

But agree with the article, with EV technology, the premium brands will need to work a lot harder to differentiate themselves, otherwise the premium will need to disappear or some will go out of business.

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7 hours ago, Mkl22 said:

Disagree. Tesla is Apple. NIO and BYD is xiaomi or Oppo. 

Quite impressive though. Likely the way forward for our future gen. 

 

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Nobody bothered to address the fact that every EV can be fast on the straights, but its a different ball game to make one which handles well along the twisties and with a linear braking feel?

Tesla is still far from the hall-mark of a handling machine, but that's beside the point. It's not meant for that at the first place, it performs extremely well for what's its designed to do. 

My point is, traditional premium marques still can draw on their past expertise and lineage in building cars. It's just that in the era of EVs, they had to become much more imaginative and creative in what they do. It's not just a solid thump from closing the doors, and swathes of premium leather here and there to command the premium. Cookie cutter designs and the same design language expressed in Small, Medium, Large templates (looking at you Germans) just doesn't cut it anymore. 

And yes, start poaching the talented software and electrical engineers. Especially the former. 

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On 10/30/2021 at 9:18 PM, Lethalstrike said:

Nobody bothered to address the fact that every EV can be fast on the straights, but its a different ball game to make one which handles well along the twisties and with a linear braking feel?

Tesla is still far from the hall-mark of a handling machine, but that's beside the point. It's not meant for that at the first place, it performs extremely well for what's its designed to do. 

My point is, traditional premium marques still can draw on their past expertise and lineage in building cars. It's just that in the era of EVs, they had to become much more imaginative and creative in what they do. It's not just a solid thump from closing the doors, and swathes of premium leather here and there to command the premium. Cookie cutter designs and the same design language expressed in Small, Medium, Large templates (looking at you Germans) just doesn't cut it anymore. 

And yes, start poaching the talented software and electrical engineers. Especially the former. 

I think the Taycan or Audi GT does drive like a normal car..

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I think the differentiation for the masses and the car lovers would be vastly different.

To me , a car with no sound is great for daily commute but horrible as a weekend drive.  A design as boring as a model 3 is worse than a toyota CHR.  
there is absolutely no excitement in the really boring ugly looking Model3.  Not to mention its average quality feel overall.
If we are talking purely singapore context.  How fast can you, do you really want to go?  I rarely drive faster than 90kmh nowadays.  Pick up of anything under 8 secs 0 to 100kmhr is really more than enough.   

so that leaves the $ talk now.   Parts maintenance petrol etc….. whic you pay as you drive or upfront $$$ for the price of the car and high rd taxes to boot along the way.  A young chap once commented to me, that when tesla is out, he will buy one becos he estimated the cost to be $80k all in.  I told him it will at least be double that, knowing how our govt works 😁🤣.    It has been 2 yrs since, i dont see him with his Tesla.

 now, the last thing i will highlight reveals truly what has already happen historically.  
digital watch versus mechanical watch.  
Everybody thought the digital watch would destroy the mechnical watch industry totally in the earlys years of introduction.

Even Rolex came up with quartz models in full solid gold no less!   In the end? What happened?

the culture of the new world and new world products is Use and throw, buy latest one.  
It does not savour nor relish the deeper inner things in life.  

in the end NOBODY WANTED TO BUY AN OLD DIGITAL WATCH. Not even when it was cheap  It was use, abuse, throw, get new.

while some may argue that for Tesla, just upgrade software. Its not so simple, hi tech stuff must have high tech look and feel.  Moreover we all know, Tesla also not stupid, if let you upgrade for free, how they sell new cars? If sell new cars, then how about old Teslas? For example how much would you pay for a 5 yr old Iphone 13?  I also dont know but i probably wouldnt.  So the one who buys new and does not sell within a year or two is screwed?    There isnt a right or wrong in the choice of your car.
All  these things we dont know, its in the future and i am just thinking aloud .

 No one knows what the future holds and my one simple take is not to read into the future too much, the present is most important.  
i think i will stick to my 3.5liter fuel guzzler “hi tech” car for the time being.   Maybe its just me, the tech laggard.  Or it could be the really smooth creamy feel of my V6 engine.

Edited by Throttle2
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30 minutes ago, Throttle2 said:

 No one knows what the future holds and my one simple take is not to read into the future too much, the present is most important.  
i think i will stick to my 3.5liter fuel guzzler “hi tech” car for the time being.   Maybe its just me, the tech laggard.  Or it could be the really smooth creamy feel of my V6 engine.

must HODL the IL6 and V6 engine liao .... V8/V10 has been "vintage" liao .... LOL

last time a street car E92 M3 = V8 and E60 M5 = V10 .... that's history liao .... 

Edited by Wt_know
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in the future combustion cars will be like the vintage and classic cars we have now. largely play things for the weekends or holidays. vast majority of the daily commutes will be with electric.

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31 minutes ago, Mkl22 said:

in the future combustion cars will be like the vintage and classic cars we have now. largely play things for the weekends or holidays. vast majority of the daily commutes will be with electric.

Well not every combustion car….😗

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