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Do you only understand train station when you hear this title? Well, let me explain it to you. I may be wrong, but the Stuttgart nomenclature is taking on a new twist. Despite the manageable success of the BMW-i positioning, they want to counteract the diesel discontent of the future with a new name and instead of simply integrating the electric future, it is initially being positioned in an expressionistic manner. And while Kevin and Chantalle were once fashionable names, anyone who was punished with this today would thank their parents for the rest of their lives. If he understands it. The Paris Motor Show said “bye, goodbye and au revoir” to diesel. The future will be electric! Everywhere!
QED: EQA, EQB, EQC, EQE, EQS, EQG and WTF
There is no way around the electric drive, not even in Stuttgart!
Sweet Spot electrification
If you want to give TESLA and the Wolfsburg Diesel Curse the necessary and well-deserved attention, then there is no way around the electric motor. Sooner or later, at the end of the costly path to maximizing efficiency, there will be a three-phase motor wound with copper wire. Reciprocating pistons are married to a foreseeable future. Let heavy SUVs, commercial vehicles and long-haul vehicles keep the diesel alive for a few years, let the costs in the segment of small cars like the gasoline engine, let tricks such as variable compression and multiple charging increase the efficiency of the heroes of combustion. At the end of the journey to maximum efficiency is the electric drive. Everyone agrees on that. One can only argue about the time window.
Mercedes-Benz may currently own the latest generation of diesel engines, but understands the VW Dieselgate scandal and the threat posed by TESLA. Because here two factors have come together that influence the most contradicting segments. In order to master the danger, the electric SUV has to join the Stuttgart model range.
The E-SUV - contradictory electric madness or future path?
No automobile manufacturer survives alone, driven by investments and expenses. Money has to be brought into the till and you fill the niches that are most tempting. And what attracts more people to showrooms than the current SUV range. This is no different in Stuttgart than in the rest of the republic. SUVs are sales boosters. And it's all the more understandable to position the premium brand's first electric car right here. Others have had to make expensive experiences with a sub-brand that castigates itself away from the brand core just to conquer foreign shores. I-you don't want to experience Stuttgart as painful. Now the world premiere of the Mercedes “EQ” SUV at the Paris Motor Show.
Paris under tension - E-mobility unstoppable!
Even e-haters must have left the trade fair in Paris reconditioned. There hasn't been such a boost for electromobility for a long time. And Mercedes-Benz would like to see itself at the forefront of change with its own commitment. There will be an electric SUV in series production. Still in this decade. But that's just barely. 2018? 2019? Fall 2019? We predict the production version of the E-SUV for the IAA 2019. But good. It will come. A range of 500 kilometers is the minimum for Daimler boss Zetsche. But – even without repeating all the values of the concept vehicle – they are just “numbers”. Numbers that were already clear to you beforehand. Less than 500 kilometers? No German manufacturer has to allow this anymore.
The tactics of the Stuttgart team is much more exciting. An SUV will be the first series-produced electric car from Stuttgart, in which the range should no longer cause sweaty fear among classic car buyers. It's called the sweet spot. The segment in which it is not the constraint that makes the purchase decision, but the desire. The segment in which an ideal combination of solution and effort can be found. The area where price is no longer a hurdle. Because - that much is certain - if Mercedes-Benz offers an electric GLC, it will not represent the entry-level price, but will rather be in the upper third. € 65.000? We'll leave this number here. Nobody in Paris wanted to comment on that.
The GLC becomes the Mercedes-Benz EQG
There has to be a compulsion to give a name that advocates a clear demarcation and so Mercedes-Benz presented the sub-brand “EQ”. The idea is that the electric models from Stuttgart will embody “electrical intelligence”. And people don't dare to undertake the shift change without marketing tricks. A new name. A new millennium. A new generation. Hopefully not a new Chantalle.
Because one thing is already clear today: the Mercedes-Benz EQG will be the electric SUV. The Mercedes-Benz EQA will be the electric A-Class and a Mercedes-Benz EQS will be the Stuttgart counterpart to the Tesla Model S. Only much later. And then? What will happen in 2025? What happens if the series is electrified? What if the small “d” on the nameplate finally loses its adhesive and disappears onto museum shelves? Then the EQ will have to be laboriously brought back into the brand core of the Stuttgart “Benzen”.
A bet on the future
In the end, is EQ a bet? With the chance to simply crush a “sub-brand” and return to “business as usual”? Without experimenting with the brand core? Actually, that can't be the case. Because even if change comes late, it is right. Just a little late. While Stuttgart currently only has one strategy and one name, in Paris there are electric cars with ranges well above the fear threshold. And they call themselves Renault Zoe and Opel Ampera-e. Sounds completely understandable and not at all like Chantalle!