sharne
01-03-2009, 07:04 AM
Smart has just celebrated its 10th anniversary and the production, at Hambach in France, of its millionth car.
Both seemed unlikely prospects just a few yea rs ago. Smart has lost money for Da imler every year since its inception and Daimler talked of closing it down. After a re-structure a couple of years ago, concentrating on just one model- the second generation ForTwo it turned the corner and Smart is on track to make a modest profit.
Sales in the United States 16,000 Smarts in the first eight months of this year - have helped. The question now is What to do next? Mercedes CEO Dieter Zetsche says that it is reconsidering a second model for the range but this time it will have to be something that genuinely shares Smart's values and USP. "A Smart must never be a me-too car," he said. The abandoned Smart ForFour was no more than a Mitsubishi Colt in fancy clothes and its little sports car, the Smart Roadster, never sold in viable quantities.
Zetsche used the anniversary function to announce that a Smart ForTwo lug-in electric vehicle was being prepared for sale and that there would also be a pure electric Mercedes in the same time frame.
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Zetsche declined to say which model Mercedes was to be electrified but the likely candidate is the B-class. Both Smart and Mercede EVs will participate in a pilot project to build an infrastruc¬ture of charging points in Berlin, starting at the end of next year.
The fleet of 100 Smart EVs now running in London was an initiative of the Daimler UK - prompted by the London Congestion Charge from which electric cars are exempt and they were converted to electric power by Zytec, the British race engine manufacturer. Predictably, when Daimler decided to make a production electric Smart it took the engineering back in-house.
The definitive Smart ForTwo EV will use lithium-ion batteries and has been developed by engineers at Daimler.
Both seemed unlikely prospects just a few yea rs ago. Smart has lost money for Da imler every year since its inception and Daimler talked of closing it down. After a re-structure a couple of years ago, concentrating on just one model- the second generation ForTwo it turned the corner and Smart is on track to make a modest profit.
Sales in the United States 16,000 Smarts in the first eight months of this year - have helped. The question now is What to do next? Mercedes CEO Dieter Zetsche says that it is reconsidering a second model for the range but this time it will have to be something that genuinely shares Smart's values and USP. "A Smart must never be a me-too car," he said. The abandoned Smart ForFour was no more than a Mitsubishi Colt in fancy clothes and its little sports car, the Smart Roadster, never sold in viable quantities.
Zetsche used the anniversary function to announce that a Smart ForTwo lug-in electric vehicle was being prepared for sale and that there would also be a pure electric Mercedes in the same time frame.
422
Zetsche declined to say which model Mercedes was to be electrified but the likely candidate is the B-class. Both Smart and Mercede EVs will participate in a pilot project to build an infrastruc¬ture of charging points in Berlin, starting at the end of next year.
The fleet of 100 Smart EVs now running in London was an initiative of the Daimler UK - prompted by the London Congestion Charge from which electric cars are exempt and they were converted to electric power by Zytec, the British race engine manufacturer. Predictably, when Daimler decided to make a production electric Smart it took the engineering back in-house.
The definitive Smart ForTwo EV will use lithium-ion batteries and has been developed by engineers at Daimler.