UP FRONT
Porsche is on the back foot with the Mission E. Quite simply it needs to be amazing. No pressure, then
C’mon, Porsche, get on with it. The much vaunted Mission E can’t come soon enough for our favourite manufacturer. Late 2019 is the launch date, which means that deliveries will be in 2020 and by then who knows what the likes of Tesla will have come up with. I mean, forget Earth bound electric cars. The ever so slightly bonkers Elon Musk (he believes that we might all be just pawns in a virtual reality game, after all) has put an electric car into space, launched from his very own rocket, which kind of puts everything into perspective, really.
Quite how Musk managed to get the jump on the world’s mighty motor manufacturers I don’t quite understand, but he and Tesla are way ahead in the electric car game, not to mention the space race. Sure, there’s a lot to be said for being one of the richest men in the known universe, but with no background in this kind of stuff you’ve still got to know your onions when it comes to recruiting the brains and the boffins. The Tesla in its various forms is already astonishing and it seems to have the range thing cracked, too. The Mission E needs to be even more astonishing, then. Nothing else, really, will do and Porsche must be sweating a bit. It’s playing catch-up here, when it’s used to having the upper hand, with class leading, innovative and dynamically excellent products.
In many respects, the Mission E could well be Porsche’s most important car yet, and to coin and to mangle a well known Porsche quote/saying: ‘Excellence will be expected.’ However, if Elon is right about the virtual reality game thing, it might not matter much in the end!
Tesla is way ahead in the electric car game, not to mention the space race