THE TESLA EFFECT
When Porsche first revealed the Mission E pure-electric concept car, it bigged up its 500km range as a major selling point. Suddenly, Porsche is now characterising that range as merely 'sufficient'. In fact, Porsche has gone so far as to imply that its fast-charging technology means they can get away with sacrificing range.
So why the rapid turn around? The answer is simple. It's Tesla. Exactly how much impact Tesla has had on the broader car industry is debatable. Most of the big car manufacturers remain cautious about their plans for pure electric cars. If anything, plans have been scaled back. Audi once intended to sell an electric version of the R8, for instance. That was dropped. Likewise BMW'S I sub brand has been a failure and Renault's big push into electric has hardly been a roaring success.
There is, however, one fairly obvious exception. Porsche's Mission E is a fairly unambiguous response to Tesla. Problem is, Tesla is a moving target. Its latest revelation is the new Roadster. Tesla's fearless leader, Elon Musk, recently announced that the second generation Roadster would be good for 1000km, 250mph and 60mph in under two seconds. And that's just the base model. A version with an even bigger battery is also planned.
In an instant, Mission E's 500km range looked second rate. That's true regardless of the fact that the new Tesla Roadster is nothing more than a claim at this stage. The Roadster is due to go on sale in 2020, so around the same time frame as the Mission E. Tesla doesn't have a great track record for keeping to its own schedules. It's currently struggling to make as many as 200 of its new Model 3 electric cars. It had claimed it would be making 5000 a week by now. And the Roadster isn't quite the same size and class of car as Mission E.
Despite all that, Porsche has still been forced to shift its narrative around Mission E. Porsche's recent history has involved almost universal domination over the competition. Most of its models are hailed as best in class, some by huge margins. But in Tesla it has finally found a worthy adversary, even if only in the battle of press releases.