Aus buyers lining up for Porsche Taycan
BY TIM NICHOLSON | 10th Sep 2018
PORSCHE Cars Australia says it is experiencing significant early demand for its Taycan all-electric sportscar before the production version of the all-new four door has even been unveiled.
Previewed by the striking Mission E concept that stole the 2015 Frankfurt motor show, the Taycan will not be revealed in production guise until next year, but that hasn’t stopped Australian Porsche fans from putting their hands up for one.
Speaking to journalists in Melbourne this week, Porsche Cars Australia head of public relations Chris Jordan said the German car-maker is thrilled with the interest in the future Tesla Model S rival.
“It’s still too early to talk about too much detail but we continue to be pleasantly surprised by the interest, even at the dealer level and customers going into dealerships, by Taycan,” he said, “It hasn’t even had its world premiere.
“We don’t take official orders for the car … until we announce the price. But we already have people that are expressing interest. The next step to that is officially filling out an expression of interest form and putting down a no-commitment deposit as part of that process on a car that hasn’t had a world premiere yet.”
Mr Jordan said dealers could not provide potential buyers with much information on the model yet, and was unable to confirm the number of expressions of interest, but added that the look of the concept had clearly had an impact.
“It is funny because that demand is purely organic, based on the people that love the look of the Mission E concept. Now it has got a name, now we have confirmed it is coming to Australia in 2020 and people are going into dealerships.
“Clearly we can’t answer many of their questions as yet, but there are enough people out there that are actually prepared to informally tell the dealers that when there is more information please let me know, but then even formally, fill out our expression of interest form and no-commitment deposit.”
Mr Jordan confirmed that all 14 Australian Porsche dealers would sell the Taycan, and added that many of them had experience in discussing electrification with customers thanks to the various hybrids already in the Porsche range.
“We are working with our dealers on their EV readiness at the moment and charging and that sort of thing and how that works for dealers, big and small.
“One thing is that all of our dealers at the moment are equipped to sell a hybrid. Although that doesn’t answer all the questions, it is a step in that direction. So that is a good thing that dealers have already had to think about some of the questions around charging, around their electricity infrastructure, around having charge points in the service area and public area of the dealership.
“We obviously need to do more but there is already a thought process there. That’s part of the conversation now – making sure we are ready for 2020.”
He added that the financial commitment of readying dealerships for EV sales and service would depend on the size of the site.
“It depends on the size of the dealership I think. The investment will line up with the size of the dealership. The big item that requires significant investment is the … fast chargers. What level of charging and how many is really the question with the investment. But … the bigger dealers will have more, the smaller dealers will have less.”
As previously reported, the Taycan will use two permanently excited synchronous motors (PSMs) – similar to the ones used in the Le Mans-winning 919 Hybrid racecar – with one driving the front axle and another driving the rear wheels.
Peak power is set to be more than 440kW, but torque is yet to be confirmed. Porsche says the Taycan can complete the 0-100km/h dash in under 3.5 seconds, hit 200km/h in less than 12.0s and has a driving range of 500km.
