Discover the vehicle that helps revive Cadillac and position the General Motors logo to compete with luxury electric vehicle manufacturers, adding Tesla.
The Lyriq is an all-electric two-row SUV that Cadillac first discussed in January 2019 at the Detroit Motor Show, which shows an artistic depiction of a futuristic car on display.
On Thursday, GM revealed what the actual vehicle will look like when it goes on sale in the U.S. At the end of 2022. It will be performed for the first time in China.
Cadillac has not yet announced which U.S. plant will bring the Lyriq together, however, a source close to production said it would not be manufactured in the Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly, the facility is being retrofitted to build several new all-electric vehicles. The source asked for anonymity due to the sensitivity of the information.
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Cadillac also doesn’t release the initial price of the Lyriq, saying it will charge “less than $75,000, but will be in the right position for a medium-sized crossover with a small premium in the early days,” said Steve Carlisle, GM’s president. North america.
What GM will communicate is the importance of Lyriq for the long term luxury brand.
“This provides a key point for logo growth,” Carlisle told reporters.
Last year and this year before, Cadillac amid a logo renaissance with the arrival of new SUVs and CT4 and CT5 sedans. The redesigned Scale 2020 SUV en route to the market. The new diversity would provide the long-awaited start to Cadillac sales.
Then the coronavirus pandemic hit in March.
At the time of the quarter, Cadillac’s sales in the United States decreased by 41.4% to 23,296 vehicles. From 2020 to June, logo sales fell 29.2% to 53,621 last year. The logo struggled for years to boost sales near its peak in 2005, when Cadillac sold 235,002 cars. Last year, he sold 156,246, according to Edmunds.
But the Lyriq is now considered “a cornerstone on which we will build a long term and that long term will come with more electric cars that we will charge in the Lyriq in the coming years,” Carlisle told the media.
GM said it foresees a long-term all-electric company. It plans to market at least 20 new electric cars until 2023 and is classified as Cadillac as the logo to introduce the first generation.
The Cadillac transformation into an all-electric line planned for 2030 will be calculated and gradually integrated with the Lyriq on the way, Carlisle said.
“We want to paint about what this transformation will entail in the emerging ecosystem and how we engage a wide diversity of stakeholders to ensure our mutual success,” Carlisle said. “As the call arises, we anticipate a series of mandatory situations to announce the adoption of EV, adding the preparation of our corridor network paintings, the expansion of the cargo infrastructure and greater acceptance of visitors. We’re not aiming for a high point of sugar. “
It’s an ambitious and challenging transition and the Lyriq is a tough start for Cadillac,” said Jessica Caldwell, executive director of Insights at Edmunds. Caldwell noted that while other luxury brands offer electric SUVs, Tesla has sold many with its Model X, which features unique rear doors with gull wings.
But Lyriq’s good fortune goes beyond sales, Caldwell said. If the generation and vehicle are well executed, it can be “an exclusive opportunity to help Cadillac to its brand,” he said.
“The company has been searching, and failing, for years in its image,” Caldwell said. “If Cadillac does well and can lead consumers to see the Lyriq as competitive with Tesla and other European luxury logos, it can help push the logo in the right direction.”
This is more brand because right now, sales in the area of luxury electric SUV are small. Current players, Tesla Model X, Jaguar I-Pace and Audi e-tron, had sales of fewer than 12,000 games in the first part of 2020, Caldwell said. This compares to the same time last year, when COVID existed, when the 3 sold 13,000.
Cadillac plans to outperform its rivals by providing a bigger overall package than a charming single car, Carlisle said. To confront Tesla, he said Cadillac would address visitors’ problems around electric cars, such as battery life, charging time, connectivity and knowledge.
The Lyriq is based on GM’s next-generation modular electric vehicle platform. It will be powered through GM’s Ultium battery formula and travel more than three hundred miles on a full charge. A visitor will be able to recharge it from home, office or on the road, GM said. This is a first look at the vehicle’s features as it will not go on sale for two years.
GM is working to supply the infrastructure to electric vehicles, Carlisle said, highlighting GM’s recent partnership with EVgo. Companies will load more than 2700 new fast chargers in various public places over the next five years.
“All of this makes it an attractive product,” Carlisle said. “It starts and ends with the product, but it is also the total delight of the visitor and the delight of the property.”
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Lyriq marketing is also crucial. Cadillac will have to offer consumers a perfect delight in buying and owning the vehicle, said Melissa Grady, Cadillac’s chief marketing officer.
“We’ll have to Array … eliminate friction. When you look at a process without friction, you know that. It’s the feeling of buying anything on Amazon in two clicks and it’s on your doorstep,” Grady said. That’s not where we are now. But we know this is incredibly vital for electric vehicle customers. “
Cadillac is looking for tactics for the myCadillac cellular app.
“We’re completely reinventing the app,” Grady said. “How can we create a carefree experience? We take a look at the recharge ecosystem and tell other people where they can avoid their adventure, knowing in advance what their adventure is, to recharge.”
Grady said his team is looking for all facets of “what it means to be Cadillac” for our long-term EV. The launch of Lyriq is more than the launch of the vehicle, it is our long term.
In February, Cadillac introduced the redesigned Escalade 2020, its full-size SUV. He’s got 6, 000 orders, Carlisle said.
“We’ll start sending them to dealerships at the end of the month and beginning of September,” Carlisle said.
The Escalade has been a Cadillac icon for years, so expect an all-electric edition of the vehicle, which GM referred to in its recently released 2019 sustainability report and which Carlisle also alluded to.
“The Escalade is a franchise in its own right,” Carlisle said. “Elsewhere, we’re talking about electrified trucks and larger vehicles. So we tuned in to that one.
But will it still be called Escalade? Cadillac stated that its electric cars would have blank calls that a virtual label. It was reported that all electric cars would end with “iq”, which led the media to ask whether an electric escalade would also have a call change.
“The Escalade has a call and we don’t aim to turn that into what we would call an EV Escalade? It’s a verbal exchange per day,” Carlisle said.
He said any replacement in the Escalade signature would be a complicated decision, but Carlisle said diplomatically, “We’ll take this into consideration,” when reporters asked if Cadillac would put “iq” at the end of an electric escalade call. Training
The automaker is making a $2.2 billion investment to retrofit its Detroit-Hamtramck plant to link all-electric vehicles. GM only pledged to start building the GMC Hummer electric van next year, and then the Cruise Origin later.
In March 2019, GM announced that it would spend $300 million to build a new car at its Orion meeting facility north of Detroit. GM is recently building the Chevrolet Bolt in Orion.
In its 2019 Sustainability Report, GM indexed the next vehicles:
Cadillac
Gmc
Chevrolet
Buick
Follow Jamie L. LaReau on Twitter @jlareauan.