Volvo CEO: electric wave will kill a few Western automakers - which ones?
Volvo’s long-time CEO, Håkan Samuelsson, is returning to help the brand and openly admits that the rapid electrification of the...
As things are looking right now, the most likely candidates are Stelantis, Nissan and Volvo.
Stellantis will probably be broken up, and a few of their brands may survive.
But China too may see a couple of their automakers fail, the margins in China are basically non existent, and nobody is really making any money there ATM.
Considering the insane stock value, some may be surprised that I also think Tesla could go under, but with the steeply declining sales, I don't see any way they are actually profitable, I strongly suspect their books are cooked. Their development cycle is too slow, and they have no new products on the horizon to arrive soon.
Also although many people still don't realize it, Tesla cars are deathtraps more than any other brand, and here in Denmark, the Tesla 3 fails 30% of our mandatory safety checks. By far the worst car in the country, and results are similar in Germany, although not quite as bad, Tesla is also by far the worst car in Germany.
USA doesn't have those checks, so people there don't know they are death traps until it actually happens.
PS My neighbor just bought a VOLVO XC 40, and I have to say, it's an absolutely amazing car. So if Volvo fails it's definitely not because the cars aren't good enough IMO.
I don't think Volvo will fall. Volvo is owned by Geely which is one of more successful Chinese automaker, that has a significant presence outside of china with brands like Volvo, Polestar and Zeekr. So if Volvo disappears it will most likely be because of a decision to retire the brand.
Agree on stellantis and nissan though.
If they keep failing to make a better car model than fucking Tesla Model Y, all of them will die. And deserve it.
Volvo, stelantis, and Nissan are the obvious ones.
VAG is absolutely rat fucked if they can't differentiate Audi and VW long term.
VAG gives VW the id.2, which is well below what Audi would make. So they seem to understand the problem. However they are probably relativly fine. Good investment into going towards EVs unlike Nissan and Stellantis is just the obvious three bad companies do not make a good one, with way too much internal competition.
If I had to bet Toyota would be on the list. They still somehow believe in hydrogen fuel cells....
IMHO VAG needs to copy what Volvo did. Create a totally new EV brand free of historical baggage. Actually compete with Tesla.
Because they sure as hell seem to be unable to fix their shit with their existing brands.
