In early September 2019, Taycan, Porsche’s first mass-produced electric vehicle, was born. Taycan is considered to be Porsche’s response to Tesla Model S’s dominance of the high-performance electric vehicle market for many years.
Taycan will be delivered in April in China, but before the world premiere in September last year, Porsche has received 30,000 intent funds, and more than 15,000 customers have signed purchase contracts so far. Some time ago, Bill Gates also said in an interview that he bought a Porsche Taycan, which was his first electric car.
Obviously, the consumers targeted by Taycan and Tesla are not a group of people.
When Taycan was released, we said in the report that in daily use, Tesla’s performance is more like a fuel coupe, at most it is a performance car, because Tesla is fast However, when some overseas car owners put their Tesla on the track, they were surprised to find that at the Nurburgring North Ring Circuit with a lap of more than 20 kilometers, Tesla could not always maintain its best condition. In New North, Tesla can only support about 13 kilometers at full power output, after which the battery output will be limited.
And Taycan is a true pure electric sports car. In the road test before the release, Porsche carried out various tests on Taycan’s “destroyed” of extreme durability. 26 consecutive 0-200km / h ejectionsAt the same time, Taycan’s performance can be stabilized at the fastest and slowest with only 0.8s; at the Italian Nardo circuit, Taycan uses 800V ultra-fast charging technology to drive 3425km at an average speed of 200km / h within 24 hours, except for changing drivers And non-stop outside charging.
This test is handed over to Tesla Model S, which is obviously unrealistic.
Of course, this is not to say that Taycan has no shortcomings. In terms of hard battery life, Taycan is not too long. It can only be said that Taycan has given itself the performance of top-level fuel supercars with the advantage of electrification. But for daily use, the long-distance travel scene is not suitable for Taycan.
In the face of the so-called “electrification trend”, Porsche is not so anxious.
In 2019, Porsche delivered 280,800 new cars worldwide, an increase of 10% year-on-year; operating income reached 28.5 billion euros, an increase of 11% year-on-year; and China ’s annual new car deliveries reached 86,752 units, an increase of 8% year-on-year, accounting for 31% of Porsche’s global sales have become the world’s largest single market for the fifth consecutive year.
For Porsche, selling cars is not a problem. Electric cars will be re-launched after they are ready to make sure they are really suitable for their target consumers.
For this goal, from 2020 to 2024, Porsche will invest about 10 billion euros in hybrid power, electrification, and digitalization. After the pure electric sports car of Taycan, it will be a derivative of Taycan, the Taycan Cross Turismo, and A new generation of purely electric Macan that will debut at the end of 2022.
In addition to these, according to Michael Steiner, a member of the Porsche Global Executive Board responsible for research and development, Porsche will not be limited to the research and development of the existing model series, and the Macan is not the next-generation electric vehicle in cooperation between Porsche and Audi. The only planned model in the platform.
In fact, for a car company like Porsche, if you want to make a pure electric car and you do n’t want to smash the brand, you have to be very restrained and invest a lot.
Although the structure of the electric vehicle platform is simpler than that of the fuel car, in fact, luxury car brands like Porsche, backed by the Volkswagen Group, have been doing fuel car technology for decades, but the pure electric platform, You need to start from scratch and invest a lot.
On the other hand, because of the wide range of its own models, it is difficult to cover all products with one platform. In addition, there are not many pure electric vehicle consumer groups, and it is easy to cause poor input-output ratio. , Dragging down the company’s financial situation.
Schedner also gave an example. For example, the PPE41 platform used on the purely electric Macan was developed in cooperation with Porsche and Audi, and the added value brought by the platform. Two thirds will belong to Audi, and Porsche will account for about one third. It has been reported that PPE41 will also be used in Audi’s low models, but for Porsche, this platform is difficult to use in its own low models Boxster and Cayman, because if the battery is completely laid out like a mattress The bottom of the cabin means that the driver will sit above the battery, which is too far from the ground. The sitting position cannot be lowered, and the sports car cannot be called a sports car.
That is to say, just like Tacan, in order to ensure a more comfortable sitting position for the second row of passengers, Taycan needs to redesign the battery arrangement and leave a passenger foot socket in the rear seat battery. If Porsche wants to ensure the sitting posture of its own small sports car like Boxster and Cayman, and wants to electrify this model, it must design a new platform, which requires time and a lot of research and development costs.
And to develop a new multi-functional platform, Steiner also admitted: In the long run, this is not commercially feasible. Other car manufacturers rely on only one platform to support the development of all models. But we hope to fully develop the value of a pure electric platform architecture. We will adopt a flexible product strategy in the next ten years, and continue to provide internal combustion engine models while the models are gradually converted to pure electric. At the same time, the design will keep pace with the times to ensure that the product lineup is attractive for a long time.