In an interview with Automotive News Europe, Michael Steiner, Chief Development Officer for the Volkswagen brand Porsche, commented on the electric car and remaining combustion plans of the sports car manufacturer – and explains that he does not regard Tesla as a direct competitor. When explaining this, however, he did not refer to models, but to the positioning as a company: With the Model 3, Tesla targets the volume segment more aggressively, Steiner is quoted as saying.
Shadow boxes with Tesla in 2019
“People like to play us off against each other, but we don’t see Tesla as a direct competitor,” said the Porsche board member, according to Auto News – regardless of the fact that the two companies did a “bizarre shadow boxing” at the Nürburgring last year the fastest electric car lap between Porsche Taycan and Tesla Model S (in a modified “plaid” version, which will soon be available for purchase).
In the case of batteries, Steiner Tesla simply denied a head start and said about the range, Porsche did not strive to be the leader here. Round cells, chemistry and the cooling concept at Tesla all have “certain advantages and disadvantages,” said the Porsche development chief, according to Auto News. He described high battery capacities as in the Model S as “not ideal with regard to sustainability” – which is surprising, since the large battery in the Taycan is only around 5 percent smaller than that of Tesla Model S and at 93.4 kilowatt hours according to Porsche Model X.
“Porsche must be close to the road”
Nevertheless, Steiner told the magazine that Porsche believed in “smaller, lighter and therefore cheaper batteries” that could be charged more quickly. Apart from that, no new combustion platforms are currently being planned, but the existing ones will still be modernized. The Macan, for example, will be electric as well as conventional, because electromobility is not advancing equally quickly in all regions. The E version of the Macan will be clearly recognizable as an electric car, however, because this is what customers want in the current transition.
For the next Elektro-Platform SPE, Steiner said that very sporty cars should also be very low. Thanks to the batteries in the floor, electric cars have a low center of gravity, but that is not enough – the driver must also sit low, “as close to the road as possible”. However, the final decision has not yet been made. However, the Porsche Board of Management had another refusal from the VW Group on the subject of hydrogen fuel cells in cars: “At the moment, the technology is not suitable for us”, also because of the low energy efficiency.
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