After years as a wallflower at the Geneva Motor Show, the innovations with electric drive are on par with their classically powered, petrol or diesel burning ancestors. At least as far as the number of exhibits is concerned.
Geneva in the spring, the Mont Blanc wears its snow cap, first warm rays overcome the dying winter. As always at the beginning of March, parking spaces at the nearby airport are parked with private jets, dark limousines scooping up masses of suit-bearing managers, journalists and fence attendants at the entrances to the large exhibition halls. The car world meets for the first fair of the year on European soil, the Geneva salon gives the starting signal for the new car year. Nicer, faster, more powerful cars of all kinds should let the profits of the corporation in the coming months and make the shareholders happy.
That's how it has been in recent decades. And now it's all very different this year 2019, which will perhaps later go down in the history of the traditional fair as a final turning point. Of course, the persistent issues waft punitive tariffs, Brexit, diesel or impending traffic collapse through the halls. All of these are landmines that are carefully bypassed by the exhibitors' bosses during their performances on the premiere stages. Such crises always existed. Much more important and consequential, however, is the turning point for which the Geneva Motor Show stands this year.
The old car world with its chrome five-meter ships, power-packed eight-cylinders and ultra-flat missiles for the left lane is on the decline. Of course they are still there, the Bugatti, Lamborghini or Bentley, which must admit efficiency class G on small signs, the worst ever. The dinos are flanked by sports car small series of rather unknown manufacturers such as Pagani (562 kW / 765 PS for a roadster called Huayra) or Zenvo with the mid-engine giant TSR (866 kW / 1177 PS). Both of them, like many others, took their seats thanks to prominent refusals from renowned manufacturers such as Ford, Opel or Jaguar, whose gaps had to be filled up.
All examples of PS giants who stand a bit far for the hopeless struggle for survival of the automotive dinosaurs. Because the environment has changed. The German manager of a DAX company that does not want to be named, says: "This is not a change, this is an earthquake." He means the new world with its at least locally emission-free drives, ever-increasing batteries and higher ranges. For the first time, the number of newcomers to electric cars is on par with classic exhibits. Fifty-fifty has been reached, the Stromer could already be in the majority next year.
Of course, some of the premieres are still concept cars like the Audi Q4 E-Tron or the electric minibuses like Mercedes EQV (comes from the V-Class) and VW T6. But the premiere in real life is not sometime in the future, but in a few months. Battery-powered versions of normal small cars like the new Peugeot 208 are becoming normal. In addition there are countless so-called plug-in hybrids (can be recharged at the socket) with which Mercedes, BMW or even Audi can park their more modest stands. Electric is the new oil, the clean engine of mobility, which will then also become autonomous.
Worry about what used to be known as driving pleasure is unfounded. Because small companies have been founded that have married the fun with the green reason. An example is the rebirth of a long-forgotten brand. Hispano Suiza, an icon of the powerful and rich in the first decades of the last century, is celebrating a resurrection in Geneva. With the Carmen, which the Spanish-Swiss manufacturer describes as the "electric Hyperlux Grand Tourer". Two electric motors together deliver 750 kW / 1.019 PS. The range of the battery should be at 400 kilometers, of course, not when the maximum possible speed 4,73 long two-seater (250 km / h) is maxed out. Price: 1,8 million euros. Other small start-ups want to keep up with high-performance Stromern, including the first-time of Toni Piëch (40), the son of former VW boss Ferdinand Piëch. His electric sports car is called Piech Mark Zero.
Despite all the electrifying high voltage in Geneva, concern over the continued existence of the classic car trade shows. Too expensive for the manufacturers, decreasing numbers of visitors and rejection of important brands not only cause concern for the trade fair managers. So it is already clear that almost 20 well-known brands at the IAA in Frankfurt in the fall will be missing.