Daimler plans to invest €70 billion more in electric vehicles development

KUALA LUMPUR: The Mercedes-Benz parent company, Daimler has already put a lot of money into electric driving, but it seems that the brand has been lagging behind in its electrification efforts. So, now the German giant announced a new investment plan worth 70 billion euros (more than RM 344 billion) “to accelerate the transformation towards electrification and digitization.” from 2021 to 2025.

Before approving this budget, Daimler's work council and the company's board conducted a number of meetings, described as “controversial discussions.”

On this announcement, Ola Källenius, the head of Daimler commented, “With the Supervisory Board’s confidence in our strategic course, we will be able to invest more than €70 billion over the next five years. We want to push ahead faster in particular with electrification and digitization. In addition, we have agreed with the Works Council on a transformation fund. With this agreement, we are fulfilling our shared responsibility to actively shape the transformation of our company. Improving our profitability and targeted investment in Daimler’s future go hand-in- hand.”

With a vision to compete with Tesla in the electric vehicle market, the company mentioned that in the said period most of the money will be directed towards Mercedes-Benz’s electrification plans and some of it will go to the truck division, which is also pursuing electrification. The list of the company’s upcoming electric trucks includes the eCascadia, an electric class 8 semi-truck, and the eActros.

Mercedes-Benz EQ, the company’s electric vehicle subsidiary currently has two models in the lineup - EQC crossover and EQV electric van based on the GLC and V-Class. Back in October, the brand announced a detailed vehicle development roadmap for the next decade confirming the launch of six new EQ models - EQA, EQB, EQS, EQE, and SUV versions of EQS and EQE. In recent months, many of these have already been spotted on public roads with camouflages while testing.

Also read: Mercedes-Benz EQA unlikely to go on sale before Q2 2021