smk4565

Market shares of main line brands, and makes sense that Mercedes-Benz has less market share than Daimler-Chrysler did since they sold off the volume side of that business. Yet compare Mercedes global market share to Cadillac, Lincoln, Genesis, Infiniti, Acura, Lexus and it's a joke, they probably outsell all them combined. And probably because Mercedes does the best luxury car, best off roader, and hypercar, they hit all the pillars. Most of the luxury brands are crossover only or headed that way and some like Lincoln and Infiniti have basically no identity.

And yet they build the most high tech luxury car (and segment leader for 50 years) They also make he best off roader (that isn't a Unimog which they make too) And they make the Nurburgring record holder and have the best performance car No other brand even does all 3 (luxury, performance, off roader) let alone hit top of segment in all 3. And won 8 consecutive F1 championships prior to this year (even though that's a whole separate group of engineers), so I think the engineering side is on point. The EQ-line design team is where the improvement is needed.

The EV platform share could bring back more cars, plus range will be better on a car vs and SUV, which is why even these electric crossovers are fairly low in height compared to traditional SUVS. But if it's high dollar and low volume, who really cars. If Genesis builds this coupe and convertible they need to be G80 price range just like if Cadillac does a sedan/coupe/convertible EV it should be priced like a Lyriq. The most impressive EV on the market right now is actually the Chevrolet Bolt, if they even get $3750 tax credit in 2023 and keep their price the same, then you are talking like $23k-28k price range for one, which is basically what you pay for an Elantra or Civic. That's price parity and makes the Bolt a hell of a deal given the fuel savings too. If this Genesis convertible is like $125,000, they'll sell 1,000 of them over 3 years then cancel it and never do it again.

I don't think so. Hopefully when every Mercedes is EV, the classic design theme wins out and the EQ design theme is tossed in the trash.

I can imagine it, but don’t see them doing it.

Mercedes engineers aren’t the problem, they engineer the best cars. The problem is in the EQ design studio. And the S-class has a .22 drag coefficient and doesn’t look like soap so it’s possible. Yeah names that make sense, like Eldorado.

19,500 stores, 800 EV delivery cars. Way to go all in. Their pizza is terrible anyway, they should try to fix that.

The upside down triangle front grille looks stupid on the coupe and convertible but the rest of the design looks really good. Hopefully they make both but the bean counters may only approve SUVs for production. Imagine if Cadillac did an Eldorado coupe and convertible like this rather than the Musiq, Lyriq, Majestiq, Fantastiq, Elastiq, line of crossovers thru have coming.

It looks boring. All the new Hondas look boring, there are no body lines or styling cues, they just look super generic. Might as well call this Government Sedan and the CRV Government SUV and give a year supply of government cheese with every new purchase to entice buyers.

It is also "predicted reliability" their guess versus what past performance really is. And they also tested 2 models. Not surprised that Toyota-Lexus lead the way. Also what do these even mean? Like I can buy a BMW M5 and have more reliability and less maintenance costs than a Honda Civic?

Mega improvement, the current car is the ugliest Prius ever, this one is by far the best looking. I think it looks good, horsepower is now adequate or even more so with the Prime, I've seen 0-60 times over 10 seconds for past Priuses, this one around 7 seconds is probably quicker than most small sedans or subcompact crossovers and it gets 57 mpg. They should sell a crap ton of these.

Of this group I'd have to say the Miata. Not having driven any of them or having any experience with them, the Miata is the one that is still here so I assume is the best and most desirable. Although I'd think the Toyota MR2 or Supra are better than this group. And there is the Fox body Mustang, unless we are calling that pony car and not sports car.

But 40-50 years ago, there was a BMW 3-series, a Mercedes 450SEL now an S450, but they have always used that naming scheme. Buick never sold B1, B2, B3, or E1, E2, E3. The problem Buick, Lincoln, Cadillac all got into is they keep throwing away heritage (because of all the baggage they have) but when you keep reinventing yourself and reinventing naming schemes you keep throwing away any brand equity you had to begin with. Infiniti did the same thing. The Corolla is the #1 selling car in the world because it has been on sale for 60 years and has a reputation, you know what you get with it. The S-class, the 911, the Corvette, these are vehicles with 50+ years of reputation and you know what it is. Kia EV6, Buick Electra E5, that's just a hodgepodge of nothingness with no soul, no emotion, might as well be a refrigerator or washing machine at that point.

E1, E2, E3, etc is about as lifeless and boring as it gets. Use real names! That’s what Buick’s history and DNA is.

BYD is making electric buses and school busses in California. There has been talk of their cars coming here for a while, eventually they will. They are #2 in the world in EV sales, #1 in the world in EV + plug-in hybrid sales. All these companies talk about orders and reservations, but how many of those are just people looking to flip it for profit if they get an early one, and once that opportunity goes away they can just cancel the reservation. I'd rather see actual sales, the Cybertruk at one point had 1 million reservations, but they have sold zero o f them so who really cares until they actually sell them.

BYD will come eventually, and other Chinese cars will likely follow. If GM gets up to scale in 2024 and is rolling they can make a big impact. And since Cybertruck really won't be hitting volume until 2024, if GM can build their pickups at a faster volume they can block that threat off. And Ford can build a gas F150 every 52 seconds, but they can't make EV's at that rate. That's why this is all up for grabs. Whoever can make EVs that are actually affordable and not $100k sports sedans or $100k trucks, but run of the mill $35k crossovers that you can sell 400,000 a year of is going to be a big winner.

I am just saying if GM wants to capitalize, they need to scale up faster than VW, Toyota or Ford do or before the Chinese cars get here. And the same can be said for anyone else, whoever moves too late or slow will be left out.

BYD is doing quite well also in EV sales and targeting 4 million EV's in 2023. I assume the clock is ticking for when they decide to hit the US market with low cost EV's. The tax credit will help the domestics, but they better be ready for that too. I get it takes time to ramp up, but if BYD is at 4 million next year, 5 million+ in 2024 when GM is tagging 400,000 in 2024, that is a lot of ramping up that GM is behind on. And I think being a first mover is important with this EV switch.

It took Tesla that long because they had to build factories. A couple years ago Tesla had 1 factory capable of 500,000 units per year. Now they have 4 factories and more coming. GM, Ford, Hyundai, Toyota, etc have many factories already. GM has had the Bolt on sale for 5 years already and they are still at a 40,000 a year capacity for it with a 70,000 forecast for 2023. That's a fairly slow ramp up, when the Bolt with a tax credit next year should be the #1 selling car in America.

There might be better options, but Tesla is the only one with any production scale. You have to wait for a Hyundai or Kia because they can only make like 50,000 a year globally. They should be making 500,000 a year, but they can't. So all these car companies keep advertising EV's and getting people interested, then they have no supply, so people just go buy a Tesla.

But Tesla even with build quality issues and what are relatively high prices for their cars are still selling at an incredible rate. The Model Y is on pace to be the number 1 selling vehicle in the world next year. I don’t think the Model Y by any means is the best car or best value, but it’s the Model T of the EV car market. The Equinox could be the best EV ever and it won’t matter if they can only make 40,000 per year.

So now GM says they will produce 400,000 EV, across 2022, 2023 and first half of 2024. With 70,000 Bolts next year being the volume leader. That’s not enough volume, and that’s why this is still all up for grabs. If people want EV’s and you can’t meet demand customers will go elsewhere. This is more of a race to build capacity rather than build the best car. And this is no different than the 1910’s when most cars were hand built low volume and then Ford found a way to make a million Model T’s a year. They won because they had the most capacity, not because the Model T was a great car.

It's about the size of a Maybach S-class, a little bigger than a Flying Spur or Ghost, smaller than a Phantom. But any of those cars are more in the chauffeur driven class, no one else is making anything like that ICE or EV really.

Thanks, I googled it and nothing. But a Lucid is like 196, so not even close. The Lucid is like an AMG E63, M5, RS6 competitor, mid-size sports sedan.

Yeah, good move on VW to go to regular buttons. And the Mercedes at the end of the COMMAND era or Gen1 MBUX with the clicky-wheel (or track pad but clicky wheel I think is better) and the touch screen but still having regular buttons is better. The capacity touch and haptic feedback seems bad, and that was always a hallmark of Mercedes is how a switch clicked or felt when you pushed it. I think you need to touch things to feel quality, whether it is a button in a car, furniture, fabric, whatever. If everything is a screen, then there is no difference between a Rolls Royce and a Honda Civic as far as touching the controls.