(January 30) Aston Martin has officially delayed the launch of all of its planned electric vehicles as it attempts to get back on a solid financial basis.
Company to receive emergency funding
On Friday the company said that it would accept about $659 million in emergency funding from a group of investors led by the Lawrence Stroll the Canadian billionaire. Stroll will get about 20 percent of the company in return for the funding. As part of its plan to become financially stable, Aston Martin will focus on gasoline cars before it manufactures any electric vehicles.
The emergency funding comes after what Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Andy Palmer claimed was a very bad 2019 during which the company lost more than 100 million pounds or over $132 million US in spite of increased sales.
EV production delayed
The Rapid E supposed to be Aston Martin's first EV has had its production delayed indefinitely. The relaunch of the all-electric Lagonda sub-brand has been delayed until some time after 2025.
The Rapide E was first announced back in 2015. After setbacks it was announced that 155 Rapide E's would be available by 2019. However, earlier this month a report claimed that the company had decided to turn the car into a research project.
Aston Martin accepted Stroll's offer over that of Chinese auto group Geely
The Financial Times claimed that the Geeley offer would actually have accelerated the production of EVs as Geeley has developed EV technology with Volvo that Geeley had bought in 2010. Nevertheless Palmer insisted that he was a great advocate of electric cars and it committed to them going forward. However, at present, he seems to be concentrating on gas models. However, he said he was also focusing on the company's V6 hybrid engine for now.
Palmer noted that the electric vehicle market was developing slowly: “You also have to remember that none of our competitors, bar Porsche, will have an electric car on sale before 2025. So we are on a pretty similar timeline to them, and at the vanguard of the luxury market still."
Aston Martin needs to improve financial results
Aston Martin has been around for over a hundred years. In that time it has faced bankruptcy seven times. One again it is fighting for near-term survival. CEO Palmer said that auto manufacturing was a tough industry that he had been in for 40 years. He claimed to be good at bringing innovations to market with success. 2019 he said was a bad year but that his job now was to navigate that and he believed with the new emergency funding he had what he needed to do so
Previously published in the Digital Journal
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