Chevrolet Volt: Is Intro Time Slipping?
January 03, 2008
GM Chairman and CEO Rick Wagoner said on Thursday that the company is “currently benchtesting batteries” for Chevrolet Volt and added that, while beginning Volt production in 2010 “would be great,” he “can’t guarantee it at this time.”
GM previously has indicated that it will launch Volt around 2010, though some outside observers are skeptical that GM will have the batteries ready for the plug-in hybrid.
GM is “bench testing” two makes of advanced lithium-ion batteries to determine whether they’ll be appropriate for the E-Flex operating system that will power the Volt when the plug-in hybrid goes into production in the next few years.
Troy Clarke, a GM group vice president and president of GM North America, said that the company’s “design guys are working on the [Volt] production vintage right now,” though he declined to say when GM might show an updated version of the car.
GM Vice-Chairman Robert Lutz, a Volt champion, said in October that GM had taken delivery of batteries intended for the E-Flex system from LG Chem and that it had expected to receive a first experimental battery pack in December from A123Systems.
Appropriately, the executives’ comments on GM’s most intriguing future power train came during their kickoff online chats with media members for GMNext, which is what GM is calling its 100th-anniversary celebration. (GMNext commenced Thursday with online chats by Wagoner and 30 other GM executives from around the world. It will conclude with a major press conference and online event on Sept. 16, one century to the day after GM incorporated.)
Clarke declined to say what level of sales GM is expecting from Volt, although Lutz earlier said he hoped the company could build as many as 100,000 in the first year.
“We will start slow on the Volt and then ramp it up to what we hope to determine as the natural demand,” Clarke wrote online. “We aren’t sharing a lot of numbers yet as we are still doing the market research, considering price, promotion, distribution, etc.”
One questioner asked Clarke about the possibility of “price gouging” on Volt. Building 60,000 or more Volt units a year might allow GM to sell the plug-in for less than $30,000, Edmunds.com reported a few months ago. “I think we will wait until we are able to set a price,” Clarke said, before gouging “becomes a concern.”
Posted by Michelle Krebs at 6:31 PM under GM , Technology | Comments (2) | digg this | Seed Newsvine
What is "price gouging"?
When did middle class Americans become such entitled whiners?
The free market sets he price. People will just have to wait if it's too expensive and not throw a hissy fit and go home.
Such children.
Posted by: Jon | January 05, 2008 at 6:28 PM
I hope that they can get this thing on the road soon, and that it works like they expect it to work.
Wouldn't it be great to be independant of the oil companies and OPEC?
I want one now.
PS: Like Jon stated, the market will set the price, ultimately. Whoever asked Clarke that gouging question reveals a great deal about flawed thinking.
Posted by: Young Jedi | January 07, 2008 at 2:46 PM