By Robert Farago
October 4, 2008
So there I was, browsing a Bloomberg (three terms or bust!) story about automakers fessing-up to the fact that electric vehicles must take a back seat to “normal” fuel-efficient small cars– which is a pretty good piece of Parisian bloggage in and of itself– when BANG! I run smack dab into a quote from the highest paid auto exec on planet Earth: Porsche SE Chief Wendelin Wiedeking. “Do you believe people will actually switch to smaller cars?” Wendy asked, in the midst of discussing Porsche’s yet-to-unveiled fuel-sucking four-door. Uh, yes? Nein! “This car fits into these times,” Wiedeking insisted. “You should go on a journey in a small car with your four-person family. What will happen is you will have had enough when you get to the border after a couple of kilometers.” Hmmm. Why is Wendy dreaming of heading for the border? Of course, by “people” Wendy means the same sort of customer GM Car Czar Bob Lutz referred to when confronted by the fuel-suckage of the then-new GMT900 SUVs (i.e. rich people don’t care about the price of gas). Meanwhile, back in the world of mass motoring, GM Europe Prez dismissed the impact of his company’s Hail Mary plug-in hybrid Volt: “The ordinary guy has to be able to afford these technologies, and the technology in the beginning will be quite expensive.” Toyota, for some reason, gets the last word. “The Japanese company’s executive vice president for strategy, Mitsuo Kinoshita, was more blunt about a world without low-emission technologies that supplant gasoline. In that scenario, ‘There is no future for automobiles.’”
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POWERED
October 4th, 2008 at 9:48 am
“I wouldn’t put the sticker across the doors, if it was me”
“If it were I”
If I were a rich man …
October 4th, 2008 at 9:51 am
Robert Schwartz :
I’m not going there. Caption amended.
October 4th, 2008 at 10:16 am
That Porsche is the perfect car for Rick Wagoner. Rick and three of his closest GM executive buddies could all pile into it and make a high speed run for the border when the ship finally sinks. With any luck they could beat the lynch mobs with their torches and pitchforks.
October 4th, 2008 at 11:20 am
ToMoCo’s Mitsuo Kinoshita was right when he stated ‘There is no future for automobiles.’” without low emission technologies. Well he needn’t worry because looks that the future of motoring will start in 2009 when the Pininfarina/Bollore partnership comes up with their all electric BO (unfortunate choice of name but they don’t mean the smelly kind but the B-zero kind). Check it out here:
http://www.pininfarina.com/index/storiaModelli/B0.html
It’s compact, light, 30KWH Li-ion polymer/supercap powered, 150 Miles range, 80 MPH topspeed and features of course regenerative braking.
Just kidding of course when I said Mr. Kinoshita had no reason to worry. If this thing goes on sale at the promised time (2009) and with the promised specs at an affordable price, Toyota’s worst nightmare would come true: a viable BEV, ushering in a premature end of Toyota’s beloved ICE age.
Luckily for the Industry Mr. Pininfarina himself died a month ago in a scooter crash in Turin. The company is up for sale so maybe the vested interests can scoop it up and prevent disaster. Food for conspiracy theorists really.
October 4th, 2008 at 1:10 pm
Dutchchris:
Luckily for the Industry Mr. Pininfarina himself died a month ago in a scooter crash in Turin. The company is up for sale so maybe the vested interests can scoop it up and prevent disaster. Food for conspiracy theorists really.
My guess is that Exxon-Mobile was somehow involved. If you run “Rex Tillerson” thru the new Sjd6 hash algorithm, you get “ayotto” – which, when re-arranged, spells ‘Toyota’.
October 4th, 2008 at 11:48 pm
$10 that a Civic sits four more comfortably than a Panamera.
October 5th, 2008 at 5:34 pm
Porsche targets a different group of buyers than GM. Even if the electric automobile comes, it will be possible to show that it works only in big numbers. Once the Golf or Corolla will sell 50% as Hybrids or whatever, then companies like Porsche can check whether it makes sense to offer this as well.
Porsche has a competitive advantage, a unique selling proposition. GM does not.
October 6th, 2008 at 12:54 am
when i first saw the picture i honestly thought it was another “pimped” out ricer mobile… way to go porsche