British billionaire Jim Ratcliffe’s Ineos group, which is mainly active in the petrochemical sector but also in the automotive sector with a first model to be launched in 2022, announced on Wednesday that it would stop development of the Fusilier, an electric 4×4, citing in particular political uncertainties.
“We are delaying the launch of the Ineos Fusilier” due to “consumer reluctance to adopt electric vehicles and uncertainty in the sector over customs duties, timing (for the ban on thermal vehicles, editor’s note) and taxation,” according to a statement.
Before the legislative elections
The announcement comes on the eve of a general election in the United Kingdom, in which the Labour Party is clearly the winner. However, the latter promises to reinstate the ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars in the United Kingdom from 2030, a target that the Conservative government had recently postponed to 2035.
Production of the Fusilier was due to start in 2027 (already delayed compared to the initial schedule). The group was unable to specify on Wednesday the duration of this new delay.
The project “is on hold, but it is categorically not abandoned,” an Ineos spokesperson told AFP.
The Fusilier will also be thermal
Ineos, which had previously said it intended to develop an electric vehicle in 2022, unveiled the lines of its Fusilier in London in February, which was originally to be built at its factory in Hambach, France, but will now be manufactured in Austria.
It will include a version with a small internal combustion engine to increase its autonomy, which, according to current regulations, “would be banned in (continental) Europe and the United Kingdom in 2035, or even earlier in the United Kingdom if Labour were elected,” Ineos worried in its press release. As a small-volume manufacturer, we can only produce vehicles that sell,” argues Ineos, which demands “long-term clarity from policy makers.”
The Fusilier is intended to be a slightly smaller version of the Grenadier 4×4, the brand’s first vehicle, which is powered by a combustion engine. In May, Ineos announced that it was working on a hydrogen version of its Grenadier 4×4, but clarified that it was still far from mass production, pointing in particular to a lack of infrastructure for refuelling, the high costs of isolating hydrogen in pure form and a lack of political will.
Source: BFM TV
