How will the Chevrolet Volt be better than a Toyota Prius plug-in hybrid?

Volt doesn't target middle-market.

 

The base PiP is $32,000 - $2500 tax credit = $29,500.
For the Volt the base price is now $39,145 - $7500 = $31,645.

So the gross premium for the Volt is $2145 over the PiP, thus it is reasonable to conclude that if the volt does not target your target model for the middle-market, than neither does the PiP.


And for even more fun in that comparison, What is the lease price of a PiP compared to a Volt?

 

Nice pickup.
So Volt is compared to a ICE non-hybrid counterpart at GM - mission considered accomplished?
And PHV is compared to a Gen III (model which still leads efficiency/MPG for one decade), and 33% is a lot of room to develop?

Just that?

 

What would the PiP stats look like if it had a 10 kWh pack? 16 kWh? There's your room for improvement. With a 16 kWh pack, and the tax incentive, a PiP would cost the same as a Volt, have more EV range, and I would be its biggest fan. Toyota knew for years the structure of the tax credit, and yet did not exploit that. An astonishingly conservative approach.

I suppose, if the PiP is sold in greater numbers in countries that do not have tax incentives, that would explain the small pack. It just means that Americans have been shortchanged. But, America is all about choice, and the Volt makes a lot more sense than a PiP for a lot of people.

 

Target is based on COST TO PRODUCE, not purchase price.

The dependency on tax-credit is a major liability, one unrealistic to overcome prior to that subsidy expiring. And that still comes up shy of the $30,000 mark, the accepted threshold for middle-market.

How will that COST of Volt be reduced by over $9,000 in such a short amount of time?

 

Your room for improvement is only pointing towards a bigger pack? Well, that's easy, isn't it? The harder part has been done, which is making the Prius.

Volt "can" make more sense (your words?), but IMPOV the meaning of "lot more sense" and "for a lot of people" does not cope with price/costs. Also trunk/seats are to be considered, and that can reduce "a lot" to "a few". And yes, it is an american car, "a few" can make up to "a crowd" (proud, why not?).

 

NNNNNNN....o. I don't need 250 mile range. I don't need jack-rabbit starts. I don't want a gas tank, muffler, oil, filter, and ICE. They are both 4 passenger cars. I don't want a car that needs premium unleaded, and when it runs out of battery in 25 miles, resorts to burning gasoline at 37 mpg at best. My miev gets 112mpge...virtually all the time. And I don't have to worry about dual propulsion systems.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

 

I've never seen that argument ever. But I'm curious, how much does the prius phv cost to produce? Toyota is very secretive on these maters.

Both cars are dependent on the tax credits while the costs decrease. What happens when someone say in Texas tries to buy a prius phv. The cost is much higher than $30K isn't it. Do prices magically not included taxes or delivery charges now? Where did the $30K threshold come from? Both cars do fit the description of niche market though.

It won't. Reductions are not likely to happen to either car until the next generation.

Both cars are niche cars for initial adopters. Why not talk about their features and benefits and cost to the customer instead of the mid market bs?

 

+1

Yep. Its not the right car for say me, but it does make a good car for you. That is why we don't just have the government pick which car to build and buy.

Have fun with the imev.

 

Taking an economics or accounting class reveals cost & price are two very different values.

According to whom? The design of PHV clearly offers a balance very much in line with what middle-market currently purchases. Looking at the models of Corolla & Camry being sold easily confirms that.

 

EXACTLY!!!!!!!

The hard part has been done. The PiP is not yet there, but for whatever reason, they just left it that way.

 

As so for you being aimed at the middle market is not about what people pay, but about what it costs companies to make. So the Prius should never have been built because it cost them so much it did not make a profit for 7 years. Aiming for a market is aiming for where its going, not where it is. And 30K is about average, and being near the average price is already aiming at the middle market.

Sorry but in my book middle market is about the expect price point. And aiming for a future middle market does not mean making a short term profit. Often that is not about cutting the cost, its about not letting the cost grow over the time.

Do you know the costs to produce a PiP or A volt? How much profit per car are they making? How much do they need to make it work for middle market? Where did you get $9000. To make up for the loss of subsidy they only need to cut $7500?

If nothing changes, they get 200,000 "credits", which is probably 4-6 years worth of sales. By then it will be Gen II and they should have achieved production efficiencies and it is expected battery costs will be significantly reduced. The cost of batteris is not the raw materials and compared to many car parts its not even high precision manufacturing.
Once that is highly automated, costs could be much lower.

And GM has already achieved scaling and efficiency that was not initially expected. Two years ago it was expecte it would take 2 shifts at the plant to be able to produce 5000 Volts a month. They have already demonstrated the ability to produce almost that many with just 1 shift.


You can speculate all you want about the future and where things are aimed, but that just it your speculation.

 

Rollout began in 1997, limited to Japan only. Profit was achieved in 2002. That's 5 years, and in an era when was gas was dirt cheap, automakers were rolling in money, and there was no urgency to advance quickly... which is very, very different from the situation now.

The spin & denial here about cost, profit, and price won't change how the market responds.

It's really sad that things turned out this way.

 

Can you provide a reference for profit in 2002? Maybe you are excluding the reinvestment for the Gen II? As I recall it was 2008 before it was profitable.
I could not find a toyota press release but here is an LAtimes article from March 17, 2009|Ken Bensinger that said

And it was not profitable enough to build the US plant they had been talking about for years.



And yes it is sad to see your spin and denial here, but such is life.

 

Grow up.

 

Why yes, and bears and whales are quite different things too. I guess I am still missing your point. A mid market priced object is determined by its price not its cost. Go talk to your marketing department at work and ask them. Its a fundamental part of marketing.

The Gen I prius costs much more than it was priced. That didn't really matter on the marketing. Lutz on the other hand was hung up on how much it cost, which seems to be your hang up on batteries. Toyota had deep enough pockets to price it where they wanted to for it to get traction. This investment allowed it to grow volume, which reduced costs enough for it to profitable. I have no idea what the cost of a prius phv is, but I do know its price. Do you somehow know its costs? How do you allocate development or fixed costs when deciding it is mid market?

If the DOE is right the cost of a 16kwh battery pack will drop to less than $5K. That seems to indicate from a cost/value point of view, toyota will likely increase the size of its battery pack in gen II. Does that mean the price needs to go up? Ofcourse not. But equally we should not assume the next generation Toyota phev will only have a 4.4kwh pack, that would be silly.

 

Ouch.. that cut to the quick.
Not!

Guess the facts are too much, so it is time for you to resort to insults.

I'm just challenging your selective, and sometimes incorrect, presentation of history and continual anti-Volt/Anti-GM rhetoric, or as its often called, spin.


With respect to how long it took become profitable. Here is another article, this one from Newsweek in 2008, that says they had reached break-even (hence not yet profit or because they would say that.).

Japan Takes the Lead in Green Cars - The Daily Beast

Here is more fun one..

John's Stuff - Toyota Prius Misconceptions

where you wrote

So in 2007 you were considering profit a "realistic expectation", not a historical fact.



Toyota took a long-term view and underwrote the car's price for years.. maybe a full decade. GM might have orginally planned something like that, back in 2007. But after the bailout, combined with the government ownership, selling at at 10K loss would be a total death sentence. As it was, with very minimal direct GM specific underwriting, the Volt still became a political punching bag. If the government sell its shares, and GM wants to use its profits to underwrite the Volt, as Toyota did with the Prius, it can drop the price of the Volt to gain market share.

 

Doesn't matter. It's the same old stuff we've seen in the past. No matter what is posted, there's always an effort to prevent any type of conclusion to be drawn and misleading about intent.

Meanwhile, the winner is selected by votes with wallets & purses, not words in forums.

Watch the sales.

 

Do you have trouble reading? Or is selective quoting just very exciting for you?

As I said. You don't want or need certain features fine. That doesn't mean those features are therefore free and the vehicle is overpriced. It means the vehicle isn't for you.

 

My challenge is pushing for something better. Why settle for a lower grade, knowing there's potential for more?

The effort is to get GM back on its feet, make it competitive rather than remaining dependent.

It's not "anti" when you point out requirements. That knowledge is how a student achieves an A. So what if others in the class are already doing better. That has nothing to do with the student getting attention.