Volvo Car Group President and CEO Hakan Samuelsson laid out the company’s new business strategy that includes introducing a new EV every year through 2025 and slashing the carbon footprint of the lifecycle of every car and SUV it builds by 40%. All of the changes are aimed at Volvo Cars’ target to become a climate neutral company by 2040. TechCrunch reports: A critical piece to hitting its target will be making more EVs available. The automaker plans to launch an all-electric car every year over the next five years. By 2025, it wants all-electric vehicles to represent 50% of global sales with the rest compromised by hybrids. As of this year, every new Volvo launched will be electrified, which means it could be a hybrid, plug-in electric (PHEV) or all-electric (BEV) vehicle. To hit this target, every Volvo model will include a Recharge option. This means a plug-in hybrid or all-electric version will be available, according to the company. To further encourage electric driving, every Volvo Recharge plug-in hybrid model will come with free electricity for a year, provided through a refund for the average electricity cost during that period. Volvo also plans to triple its manufacturing capacity and is now quickly ramping up its production globally, Bjorn Annwall, head of global commercial operations at Volvo, said during the press conference. Volvo is aiming for plug-in hybrid cars to make up 20% of total sales in 2020.
Volvo isn’t ditching combustion engines completely. But it’s distancing itself from them by spinning it out. Volvo Cars and its Chinese parent company Geely Holdings will merge their existing combustion engine operations into a standalone business. The move will “clear the way for Volvo Cars to focus on the development of its all-electric range of premium cars,” Samuelsson said. “So we believe we will bring sustainability into our company, not as something to add on, because it’s good or something that is expected for us,” Samuelsson said. “We bring it into the company because we think it’s really good for our business. It will make our company grow faster it will make our company stronger exactly as safety made Volvo stronger.”
of this story at Slashdot.
Source:: Slashdot