Remember the Mexican stand-off at the end of Reservoir Dogs or, better, the one that concluded the similarly Tarantino-scripted True Romance? It feels like we’re getting towards something not entirely dissimilar between car manufacturers and legislators. Everyone standing around, waiting for someone on the other side to blink.
Car manufacturers the world over find themselves caught in a perfect storm, unimaginable only a few years ago. The slowdown in the Chinese economy, the Trump tariffs and the dawning realisation that EV take up is happening at a fraction of the rate initially expected have produced hideous trading conditions. And while there is nothing the industry can do about Trump and China, on the EV front, it feels it has some leverage. And as this is the only front on which it is capable of fighting, fighting it duly is.
In perhaps the most significant move of this glacially slowly unfolding crisis, Porsche has announced it has pretty much binned its EV strategy. Its new flagship SUV, positioned above the Cayenne, is no longer going to be an EV. An all-new EV platform has been indefinitely delayed. Production of ICE and hybrid cars will now continue ‘well into the 2030s’ and even the new Boxster and Cayman, which we have been told over and over will be EV only, are now to come with ICE powertrains for ‘top’ versions. What ‘top’ means in this context is anyone’s guess, but it could be used to cover far more cars than just GT4s and Spyders.
