When are you going fully electric?

jpaul said:
the i4 is more expensive than tesla 3, perhaps, because, they haven't got a dedicated platform, which may inhibit i4 sales, no estate variant either;
so Audi A4 and even Jag might be prudent to wait until they can see i4 sales, demand for saloons, before leap-frogging in with a dedicated (& better priced) platform.
Do we know if the electric A6 will really be a saloon or, does it have height of a cross-over.

Whether better battery density too, will open up better optimised saloon platform designs, not currently available.
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Or it’s more like they don’t want to compete directly with the Model 3, everyone compared everything with a Tesla at the end of the day.

They’ve built a more premium car and priced it accordingly and Audi just haven’t bothered.

There is more money in crossovers/SUVs anyway so they may well just be happy to give up market share in that segment at the moment while concentrating on more profitable segments.
 
[TW]Fox said:
Whilst expensive new cars finally getting features retrofitted which they should have had in the first place and are standard on a small Kia hatchback is good, let's not pretend it's an amazing benefit :p
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Well pretty much every luxury ICE and hybrid car for the next year wont have wireless airplay/carplay due to shortages and manufacturers are keeping the equipment for their EV vehicles.
 
jpaul said:
the i4 is more expensive than tesla 3, perhaps, because, they haven't got a dedicated platform, which may inhibit i4 sales, no estate variant either;
so Audi A4 and even Jag might be prudent to wait until they can see i4 sales, demand for saloons, before leap-frogging in with a dedicated (& better priced) platform.
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Perhaps they are hoping if they wait long enough they'll catch people swapping from a Tesla M3 to something they might offer, possibly. There are so many M3's now on the road, and with almost no real competition over the next 18-24 months they are going to run away with the mid-sized saloon market for at least that length of time.

I've also noticed a lot more people who were hesitant to BEV's (and specifically Tesla) but used the BIK excuse to get into one, are now of changed tune, and are more than happy with what they are driving. I wonder how hard it would be for them after ~3 years to get in to a car full of buttons, switches and a look of general clutter, it will be interesting to see.
 
[TW]Fox said:
Whilst expensive new cars finally getting features retrofitted which they should have had in the first place and are standard on a small Kia hatchback is good, let's not pretend it's an amazing benefit :p
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Let’s not pretend I made it out to be an amazing benefit either. Would hate you to construct a narrative around that. Few other tweaks and updates as you would expect.

how much is CarPlay on BMWs?
 
Jonnycoupe said:
I’m not close to most infotainment to know what my expectations should be…. not sure what the EV aspect has to do specifically with infotainment which begs the question why did I post it in here.

My Velar got an update to push CarPlay to the car and then this to existing cars I thought was pretty cool, no fee, no subscription. Or is cars getting better with time only a Tesla strap line?
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I just have the naive mindset that EVs generally tend to be loaded with latest and greatest tech is all. I was surprised to read that jag didn't include this quite simple tech as standard anyway is all.
 
I must behind, I thought wireless CarPlay was pretty infrequent. Last I knew it was subscription based anyway on some OEMs?

[TW]Fox said:
An unacceptable amount of money presumably.

I do wonder why you see everything I say through some imagined 'BMW is better' angle. On the contrary BMW have been rubbish when it comes to adoption of smartphone integration.
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you have form :p:cry:
 
[TW]Fox said:
An unacceptable amount of money presumably.

I do wonder why you see everything I say through some imagined 'BMW is better' angle. On the contrary BMW have been rubbish when it comes to adoption of smartphone integration.
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Most options on BMW are tbh whereas rival manufacturers include them in their base car.
 
Greebo said:
Most options on BMW are tbh whereas rival manufacturers include them in their base car.
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It tends to be a German thing - all BMW, Merc and Audi charge for stuff which has been standard on low cost Korean and Japanese made cars for years. Then Porsche take it another step up and charge even more for less.
Talking of Carplay - Ferrari charge £4k for this on the Portofino :cry:
 
SDK^ said:
It tends to be a German thing - all BMW, Merc and Audi charge for stuff which has been standard on low cost Korean and Japanese made cars for years. Then Porsche take it another step up and charge even more for less.
Talking of Carplay - Ferrari charge £4k for this on the Portofino :cry:
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To be fair of Merc and Audi they are both standard in the top end model range eg premium and sline. BMW still like to keep it seperate and charge you for it.

AGreed on Porsche. I noticed one year on the HUD. Since its the same HUD across the whole VAG group (hence the point of them sharing platforms and tech to keep costs down) VW charged £995, Audi charged £1295 and Porsche charged £2k - all for the same exact piece of tech. Thats an extra £1,005 profit for Porsche right there.
 
Jonnycoupe said:
I must behind, I thought wireless CarPlay was pretty infrequent. Last I knew it was subscription based anyway on some OEMs?
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My "cheap" hyundai Ioniq has android autoplay which is also wireless. So it's Google driven and free. I've no experience of CarPlay but I presume it'll be of a more premium interface.
 
There will be a licensing cost to the automaker I’d expect on both Apple and Android.

At the end of the day the German automakers (particularly Porsche) would charge for window wipers if they could get away with it.

While people buy them in their droves nothing will change on that front.
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
There is more money in crossovers/SUVs anyway so they may well just be happy to give up market share in that segment at the moment while concentrating on more profitable segments.
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I hadn't realised tesla structural battery packs are not yet in the wild - but that kind of tech should help drive saloon form factors
https://cleantechnica.com/2021/07/1...n-production-structural-battery-packs-coming/
until a platform update I don't think they'll be exploiting their compactness - car will just be more rigid


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Greebo said:
Well pretty much every luxury ICE and hybrid car for the next year wont have wireless airplay/carplay due to shortages and manufacturers are keeping the equipment for their EV vehicles.
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current car play pitfall related
While iOS 15 does come with lots of improvements, including new notifications and a 3D navigation mode in Apple Maps, it also seems to be causing quite a nightmare for CarPlay users, as it produces a full crash whenever they attempt to listen to music in the car.
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]
 
Yep 4680 cells, bonded lid and not serviceable is not with customers yet. Plaid + was the understood first intro but that’s canned of course. Maybe it’s GigaBerlin?
 
The issue with saloons is footwell space rather than anything else, the same would be the case for other low cars. I doubt structural packs will change that materially.

The skateboard design means the whole floor is higher compared to an ICE. You can of course make cut outs in the pack for footwells but you get a smaller, more complex pack.

You’ll always have a compromise between height, pack size and rear passenger comfort in low (aka normal sized) cars.
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
At the end of the day the German automakers (particularly Porsche) would charge for window wipers if they could get away with it.
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They literally charge extra for a wiper. You want a rear wiper on a 911 - £250.
Sure, most people probably don’t want it but just make it a no cost ‘delete’ option.
 
Meta ev analysis from spectrum -> As Electric Car Makers Ante Up Billions, Software Is Ace in the Hole

...
. Udo Hänle, BMW's Head of production strategy is quoted in (feb 20) Automotive News Europestory as saying, "In our view, market forecasts are too uncertain to warrant inflexible, electro-only platforms."
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Admittedly emulating Tesla, VW has moved to consolidate the functionality of dozens of ECUs (and multiple electronic architectures) into a small set of central servers running its own core operating system/middleware to create a better separation of hardware from software development, which can reduce the complexity of producing both. It also allows VW to more easily add or update software-driven vehicle features, including software from open source suppliers rather than only from its traditional supplier base.

Another reason VW chose to build its own OS instead of using something like Google's Android OS (which Ford and GM are doing) is to keep tight control over vehicle data that can be monetized in the future. VW believes that it will generate "triple-digit-millions" in sales in the future through selling customized services, like offering autonomous driving on a pay-per-use basis. It envisions customers would be willing to pay 7 euros per hour for the capability.
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Haven't seen a bom of vw/tesla, but, if they have fewer chips inside, could be less susceptible to shortage, albeit bigger area chips can have lower yield.
The current CC/AA subscriptions could look like chicken feed.
Yes - vw had problems, despite the architecture choice.
 
As much as I like the idea the numbers just don't make sense for me. I mean I looked at a Kona in petrol and they desperately wanted to sell me one top spec they did for £14k less than the electric equivalent. Even at the £200 a month I might spend on fuel, that's a lot of upfront cost for a similar car. And that's for a car in small SUV style with no boot either in petrol or electric. The boot is smaller than a Honda Jazz! The cost for something useful as a small SUV is just not feasible for me to justify the outlay. Even something Arona or Ateca sized would end up costing what double the cost?
 
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