WILL PORSCHE’S TAYCAN CHALLENGE TESLA’S EV HEGEMONY?
It just debuted, but Porsche has already taken some 30,000 deposits for its new Taycan. Not exactly Tesla numbers, but impressive nonetheless. Closer to home, more than 1,000 Canadians have plunked down $2,500, hoping to secure one of the first electrified Porsche four-doors to hit the street.
A more appropriate context might be to note that the number of deposits is roughly equal to the number of 911s Porsche Canada sells in its best of years.
The company is depending on the Taycan to be successful. Detlev von Platen, Porsche’s executive board member for sales and marketing, said the company will invest more than US$6 billion in battery power over the next few years and expects more than 50 per cent of the company’s cars to be electrified within the next decade.
More important, the automotive industry needs the Taycan to be successful. So far, the electric-vehicle segment has been all Tesla, the Silicon Valley upstart the only truly successful purveyor of battery power. I know Nissan’s Leaf remains the bestselling EV of all time, but it’s actually selling barely 10 per cent of initial projections when it was introduced 10 years ago.
Tesla, meanwhile, has become the poster child for planet-friendly motoring. Elon Musk’s decision to focus on the luxury segment — whether it was brilliant insight or luck really doesn’t matter — is proving to be providential. Whither goes Tesla, it now seems, goes the entire electric-vehicle industry.
The problem is that Musk’s influence and the cult-like devotion it has engendered is not good for anyone except Tesla shareholders. Musk so dominates the conversation surrounding EVs that it stifles discussion into what a truly multi-platform zero-emissions future might look like.
The company and man deserve all the accolades they have received for a) creating the luxury EV segment where none existed and b) legitimizing the concept of the battery-powered car in the eyes of a formerly skeptical audience.
The problem is that the worship has gone too far, creating disciples for whom any dissent — any mention of competitive brands — is seen as traitorous. In my 35 years in this business, I have seen nothing to match the cult-like allegiance Tesla enjoys among its minions.
The problem automakers face is that any time they introduce a (costly to develop) EV, they are met with the mildest of “mehs.” Initially, they were decried as too ugly (Chevy’s Bolt), too slow (the Kia Soul) or lacking in panache (pretty much every one). But, then Jaguar came out with the I-Pace, offering both pedigree and panache. Yet it too was greeted with another giant yawn.
And that’s why the Taycan is so important. It meets every single objection even the most devoted of Teslarati could dream up. Brand image? None is stronger than Porsche’s. Build quality? Ditto. Beauty? The Taycan is the four-door 911 that Porsche always promised the Panamera would be. Ludicrously fast? My lord, yes. Toss in handling that is all but a match for the best of supercars and you have a car that is markedly superior to the Tesla Model S it ostensibly competes with.
Oh, the haters will no doubt point to its price as an objection — the base Turbo starts at $173,900 and the Turbo S is a wallet-stretching $213,900 — but the fact remains that if the Taycan fails to become a genuine Tesla rival — if not in sales, then at least in influence — we really may have to come to grips with the possibility that what we have been projecting as an electrified future is really just cult worship writ especially large.
What the faithful don’t seem to realize is that their devotion is counterproductive to the propagation of EVs they claim to promote. Think of what happens if the Taycan, superior in almost every way, fails. The immediate reaction would be Porsche’s reassessment of its US$6-billion investment in EVs. Ditto for the €80 billion that parent Volkswagen has devoted to electric vehicles. Indeed, who among legacy automakers will be willing to shell out the big bucks EV protagonists demand they devote to electrification when they see that even a clearly superior product gets steamrollered by the Tesla propaganda machine?
The auto industry needs the Taycan to be successful. Otherwise, the entire EV market, certainly the luxury portion of it, threatens to become a cult devoted to one brand — and that’s not good for anyone except Mr. Musk.
Driving.ca