Let it not be said that Volkswagen isn’t going to try to make up for being a little late with an electric car strategy of its own, as it is now announcing that it will come out with a veritable explosion of EV models for the market: 40 of them, to be precise.
The diesel powered GTD hatchback (not an e-Golf) pictured
Many major automobile manufacturers have been moving quickly to create flagship electric vehicles. The Nissan Leaf holds the flag for Nissan, the Volt for Chevy and Smart ForTwo for Mercedes. Many more are coming online, and many manufacturers are trying to decide what their electric vehicle strategy is: compete for the cheapest, like the Leaf or Smart ForTwo? Aim to balance range and plug in ability, like the Volt? Or speed and luxury, like the Tesla Model S and BMW i8?
Volkswagen has decide to not compete on any specific level, but on all the levels. Like throwing spaghetti against the wall, they’re going to debut enough electric models to target every category and see what sticks. They’ll begin with 14 different models by next year, according to Bloomberg news. This was announced at Frankfurt at the International Motor Show as VW rolled out the e-Up! electric car and an electric Golf.
The e-Golf has a range of 118 miles, and a relatively pokey 0-60 of 10.4 seconds.
Price? Not announced yet. And that, of course, will be the most important part of finding out whether Volkswagen’s new strategy can work for it.
Interested in more about the e-Golf? Here’s a test drive video, in German, of the car: