No one expects Jaguar’s first EV to be a practical hatchback – on the contrary, it may be a futuristic super-sportscar to rival the likes of the Tesla Model S and BMW i8. The South Africa news outlet Independent Online reports that unnamed insiders are talking about putting the Jaguar C-X75 prototype featured in the latest James Bond movie into production. IOL says the company is expected to announce its first EV as early as 2016.
Britain’s flagship automaker has been slowly tooling down the electrification road for some time. In 2014, it said that it would eventually produce an EV, and in September 2015, it released details of three R&D projects that explore three different levels of electrification.
In December, Jaguar announced that it would field a team in next season’s FIA Formula E Championship. It will use this opportunity to develop and test a new electric motor and apply the research to making a commercially viable mass market EV.
“Formula E will enable us to engineer and test our advanced technologies under extreme performance conditions,” said Group Engineering Director Nick Rogers. “Electric vehicles will absolutely play a role in Jaguar Land Rover’s future product portfolio. It is my belief that over the next five years we will see more changes in the automotive world than in the past three decades.”
Source: Independent Online