HONDA

EXCLUSIVE: The new Prologue SUV was revealed in draft version

In the development of the American electric vehicle market, Honda Motor has long counted on cooperation with General Motors, which will share its Ultium platform for the production of Honda and Acura crossovers - one model of each brand. This week, the exterior of the Honda Prologue electric car was revealed in a draft version, the car will go on sale in 2024.

According to the official press release, Japanese and American experts helped to develop the design of the Honda Prologue, and the front design of the crossover was inspired by the appearance of the compact Honda model already offered in the European market. Special attention has been paid to aerodynamics to reduce impact air noise, because the absence of engine hum in electric vehicles makes the aerodynamic noise more distinctive. The pandemic helped Honda move to a new level of collaboration in that the electric vehicle design was developed almost entirely in a virtual environment that employees in the US and Japan had access to at the same time.

By 2030, Honda expects to sell at least 500,000 electric vehicles a year in North America, nearly a quarter of the world's total. By the end of the decade, the company expects to bring 30 new electric vehicle models to the global market and achieve full carbon neutrality by 2050. The development of the North American market will be carried out in three phases, with the launch of the Honda Prologue in 2024 the first of them.

By 2026, the company expects to start selling the first electric vehicles based on its own e:Architecture platform in the region, and the next generation of electric vehicles developed in collaboration with GM will appear a year later, only this time the emphasis will be on its accessibility. At the same time, Honda announced a new approach to organizing its dealerships. The latter provides for the availability of charging stations for customers' electric vehicles, and the volume of sales of these vehicles will directly affect the number of charging stations at the concessionaire's location. At the same time, Honda will begin training service personnel in the maintenance and repair of electric vehicles.

Autonews