The impending move to electric cars gives Genesis a huge advantage over established brands like Mercedes-Benz and BMW… at least, if you ask Genesis.
Hyundai’s luxury brand is trying to lure buyers away from traditional luxury choices with a more nimble and agile business model that can better cater to customer needs.
“If you look into ICE cars, we are starting but we are still small – but that gives us agility to do things differently, and some of these things that we do differently were very much questioned at the beginning but are now accepted and even followed by other brands,” Genesis head of operations, Connal Yan, told CarExpert.
“But with ICE cars there will always be these traditional big players.
“If you look at the automotive trend in the last five years, into electrification, mobility and all these things, we have a very good position that we can go into those trends much faster than the others.
“Therefore this is one of the reasons we are not looking at hybrids at all, but [moving]straight into EVs.”
With the brand’s focus on electrification and the announcement of two Genesis electric cars coming to Australia in 2022, it’s evident the emphasis and big push for the young luxury brand will go hand-in-hand with electrification.
“We are quiet confident that going into a complete new era of EV is a completely different ball game,” Mr Yan said.
While that seems plausible, it’s hard to ignore the idea established brands like Mercedes-Benz, Audi, and BMW – all of which have announced massive investments into electric cars – will benefit from the shift as they can leverage their heritage in the uncertain world of electrification.
“It depends how you look at it, there are pros and cons of being a bigger and smaller player,” Mr Yan said.
“I think Tesla is a good example that this thinking is not accurate because five years ago no one expected Tesla to be where it is today.”
Genesis Australia has an ambitious goal to overtake Lexus in luxury car sales and gain a 10 per cent market share.
Hot on the heels of the GV80 SUV, the brand is this year launching its G70 sedan update this month before the arrival of the GV70 SUV and G70 Shooting Brake.
These three will be followed by three electric cars in 2022, including a the Electrified G80 sedan and the e-GMP triplet to the Ioniq 5 and Kia EV6, before a further expansion of the product line-up in future years.
