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The performance EV-only offshoot brand of Volvo and Geely has its sights set on Porsche.
Astronomical allusions abound in the automotive world so naming a brand after a star isn’t unusual. Since the northern tip of Sweden is less than 1500 miles from the North Pole, Polestar isn’t a stretch for the Geely Group’s EV performance brand. What became clear from a recent press briefing, though, was the automotive star Polestar hopes to displace is located several hundred miles south of its Gothenburg headquarters—VW’s Porsche. While this focus may not have been clear during Polestar’s first four years as an EV brand (it started 20 years earlier as Volvo’s racing arm), the business plan for upcoming product makes it clear.
Next year the five-passenger E-class SUV Polestar 3 will be introduced with a 370-mile range. Based on the SPA2 Volvo platform and built in Volvo’s new South Carolina manufacturing plant, it will have single motor and dual-motor versions and has the Porsche Cayenne in its crosshairs. Polestar execs call it the first true Polestar (as opposed to a modified Volvo) product.
The following year (2023) the Polestar 4 is schedule to arrive to take on the Porsche Macan. Finally, this portion of the brand’s expansion will then welcome the Polestar 5, a four-door luxury sport GT, in 2024. Based on the Precept concept car from last year, it’s destined to take on the Panamera and Taycan from the Stuttgart competitor.
Sprinkled among these three new models will be an array of proprietary technology developed in-house at Polestar. The company was suitably vague when asked in which specific models the tech would show up, but it was clear that by the advent of the Polestar 5 all would be available. That model will feature a Polestar-designed aluminum space frame.
Aiming to outgun Porsche and Tesla, future Polestars will carry a 450-KW (600-hp) electric motor and a two-speed gearbox featuring dual clutch and disconnect. Working with Geely partners Volvo Cars and Lotus, it’s also developing an 800V battery pack that will also come in a 400V version. The focus is on fast-charging (20 minutes to 80% charge) and bi-directional capability.
Partnering with Luminar, Nvidia, Waymo, and Zenseact, Polestar aims to use over-the-air updates to advance autonomous driving features over the lifetime of the vehicle (and potentially add revenue, you’ll see shortly).
The one new model per year approach is designed to boost the Polestar brand from a minor player to a solid and profitable niche by 2025. On target to hit sales of 29,000 units this year (from the Polestar 1 and Polestar 2 models), Polestar projects worldwide sales in 2025 will expand 10X to 290,000. As a comparison, Porsche produced 272,000 cars in 2020, a 14% increase in the past five years, but during the past decade the sports car maker has increased by 64%.
Polestar is very focused globally and expects its sales mix to continue much as it is today—40% in Europe, 30% in Asia and 30% in North America. It plans to have 50 of its retail locations—Polestar Spaces—in the US by 2025, twice the number at the end of 2021.
Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath has emphasized that Polestar is confident about its growth because of its Geely connections. Even though it’s an independent company, it can easily draw on the engineering resources of other Geely companies like Volvo and Lotus and use Geely’s manufacturing capacity in China and the US. Polestar expects to bring in $1.6 billion in revenue this year, reach a break-even point in 2023, and be turning a profit by 2025. It went public via a SPAC merger with Gores Guggenheim and expects to have a valuation of $20 billion.
One of the tools Polestar is using to increase its profitability is software sales. This week the company announced the downloadable performance upgrade for its European market cars was a hit—it was installed by 400 customers in its first weeks of availability. The new software adds 50 kW to 20 Nm to the dual-motor version of the Polestar 2 and particularly adds mid-range acceleration. It cost €1000 ($1130), so those initial customers brought in approximately $450,000 in revenue to the company and provides a graphic example of how auto companies may be able to shift to new business models. The new software is expected to be available in the US next spring.
While the Polestar media program was designed as a forward look at where the company is going, it also had a backward component, what was billed as the last drive of the company’s halo car—the Polestar 1. Unlike everything that has come or will come after it, the Polestar 1 has an internal combustion engine and is technically a plug-in hybrid (PHEV).
That barely scratches the surface of how unique this $155,000 coupe is. The production run of fewer than 1500 units has already ended and the final cars are trickling into dealerships. “Tens of them will be available,” said J.P. Canton, Polestar Americas head of communications. When it was first launched in 2019, its 70-mile all-electric range was the longest of any PHEV. Three years later, it still can make that claim as most manufacturers have moved on to pure EVs.
The Polestar 1, based on a modified Volvo chassis, has a carbon fiber body (saving 500 pounds) and a 2.0-liter supercharged and turbocharged engine that cranks out 325 hp to the front wheels. Dual electric motors on the rear axle boost the overall hp to 619 and the torque to 738 lb-ft. An eight-speed automatic controls power. Two packs of batteries totaling 34 kWh borrowed from the Volvo XC90 sit under the rear seat and in the center console.
Combining the power of the three motors with the low-down weight of the batteries results in a sporty coupe that can go 0-60 in four seconds and carve canyons without a second thought. The car is definitely a collectable, given its limited run, but one you could enjoy driving every day.
Do Polestar’s plans sound too ambitious? What do you think is reasonably achievable? Have you even seen a Polestar in real life? Share your thoughts in the comments below.