Featured Today's Toyota/Subaru press release

Well since they’ve already trademarked the UX300e name it might be a pretty good argument for making a UX size BEV. The UX series is already aluminum body panels with a polymer tailgate so they’ve already seriously cut down on the weight. It’s a really small CUV and I just don’t see a 300 mile BEV on that platform. It might be closer to 200 or less unless they’ve come up with some serious power savings along the way.

The UX and Prius share a similar Global architecture so “@Tideland Prius” might be right about the Prius having an electric option.


Unsupervised!

 

Supersize Legacy sounds likely, given that it grew a full size in the past 10 years and now underpins the 3-row Ascent. Every size increase has been rewarded with a sales increase thus far, so I don't see them hitting the brakes.

 

In another report on this, mid 2020 was mentioned as when the first BEV will arrive. One of them has to have already done the ground work for a dedicated platform for this to happen
"Note from Subaru
Following this agreement with Toyota, Subaru will now shift its existing BEV development resources to this new joint project. Within this new framework, Subaru will continue its efforts to create an attractive BEV SUV for our customers, while improving efficiencies in terms of engineering, development, purchasing, and other areas through the new joint project."
Sounds like it was Subaru.

Or the first BEV won't be on a dedicated platform. The UX is the C-HR with fancier pants. A BEV C-HR is being released in China next year. Announcements about BEVs coming out from Toyota might be counting Chinese only models.

 

Toyota and Subaru have been... colluding? for some time now. They've worked out turf for both.

Examples for discussion:

The Prius c refresh for 2018 was very much informed by the Subaru Crosstrek. Very similar colors & options offered, and most of the new style cues on the c are "pro-crossover." To me that seemed a little ridiculous on a subcompact but whatever.

The Camry & Legacy are pretty much separated by AWD at this point. (Fun fact: Subaru used to contract-build Camrys for Toyota in Indiana. The arrangement was dissolved in 2016 to free up production capacity for the Ascent)

The Venza was withdrawn when it became obvious that the Outback was getting all the sales for that size.

RAV4 has long been a way to get a Forester without the expense of AWD.

The Ascent is new, not sure where it fits in- I'm guessing bigger than Highlander and smaller than Sequoia.

 

More like collaborating. Similar to Ford and GM jointly developing their new 10 speed transmission.

 

oh woe is me! where will they get the batteries?

 

Toyota and Panasonic had announced a partnership for factories in China.

The bit about a BEV dedicated platform is exciting, but at this point, the cars can all just be for China.

 

The 7th generation Legacy and 6th generation Outback (it's complicated) are just making their first appearances in showrooms now.

Supposedly these bodies were designed with space planned for batteries, but I haven't yet seen a good press-kit thing to illustrate this design feature.

I still have my sights set on a gently used 2019 Crosstrek Hybrid. It's all the stuff I like about a Prius Prime with none of the stuff I don't like.

Now if I could just find evidence that they actually made and sold some...

 

Batteries for hybrids or plug ins? As ICE platforms, they won't be ideal for BEVs; the central pan has tunnels for exhaust and drive train. Though adopting it won't be too hard, like the Bolt did from the Sonic platform.

 

I truly don't know which, I just remember reading something quite a while ago about the new layout supposedly being friendlier to the inclusion of a battery.

Back to the original topic, the press release- except for the word 'SUV' I would have hoped that this was the sweet proof of the rumored Subaru/Toyota electric MR2. Because that would be awesome.

 

Because TSS-P was left off the 2016 Prius ECO, we bought a plug-in, BMW i3-REx.

Because the BMW taught me how to drive EV, we traded in our last Prius, a Prime, for a Tesla Standard Range Plus Model 3.

It sounds like Toyota decided to dig the hole in a different direction.

Bob Wilson

 

https://insideevs.com/photo/4140449/toyota-battery-supply/
more details from the old plan from a year and a half ago


to the electric future -

 

reading that makes me feel like there's still no commitment, and even less to n/a

i suspect by 2025, we might see a micro compliance bev in cali