Hyundai, Canoo team up on cheaper EVs
Electric cars are expensive, but as the technology is refined, costs go down, allowing regular folk to get in on the EV market.
Hyundai is ramping up that mainstreaming by partnering with EV startup Canoo to build more affordable EVs for everybody.
Canoo first gained media attention in September 2019 when it announced it was going to build a subscription-only EV, at that time the world’s first and only. This new joint partnership with Hyundai will birth a scalable EV platform, a chassis the manufacturers can adapt in size, based on the vehicle type, while keeping the same basic bones the same. The scalability of the platform will make it much easier to keep costs down, as there will be fewer different components for each vehicle.
The “skateboard” design Canoo brings to the table is fairly unique, using components that serve multiple purposes. In addition to being cheaper than the competition, the Canoo platform will also be smaller and lighter. The skateboard can be used for essentially any vehicle design, which is beneficial for partner Hyundai’s plans to implement it across different models. Development costs for EVs are very high, so having a standardized platform across the Hyundai lineup will reduce the cost of both development and production.
The plan also helps Hyundai in its pursuit of sustainability goals — the brand wants to see 25 per cent of its sales attributed to electric vehicles by 2025.