Carlos Tavares, CEO of Stellantis, was present at the presentation of the new Stellantis platform for large electric cars, which will be key in the group’s future. During the event he made quite interesting statements about the industry, starting with the hypothetical price war that is going to occur between zero emissions.
According to Reuters, he stated: “If you reduce prices without taking into account the reality of your costs, you will have a bloodbath. I’m trying to avoid a race to the bottom. “I know a company that has brutally reduced prices and its profitability has collapsed brutally.”
He did not go into details about which company he was referring to, but it is clearly Tesla, which in the last year has announced price reductions in several of its models, something that we have seen in Spain recently with a cut in the access fee for the Tesla Model Y.
Elon Musk’s company has started a price war in which, for the moment, most brands are not entering, which has caused the American brand to achieve good results, for example the fact that the aforementioned Model And it has become the best-selling car in Europe in 2023.
Stellantis, according to Tavares’ words, seems that it is not going to follow that path and the group is clear that each of its electric vehicles will have the price they consider and that their modus operandi will be to directly offer affordable models.
The clearest example is that of the new electric Citroën C3, which has not specified rates, but which has announced that it will cost less than 20,000 euros. It will not be the only model with this approach and the new generation of the Fiat Panda will follow the same path.
When asked about possible distribution problems and increased car prices due to the situation in the Red Sea, Tavares declared that Stellantis should not be affected too much.
“The trip will be longer, that is true if you are going around Africa. It can have an impact on the cost (…) so there can be good discussions about the costs and how we should mitigate it. But at this stage, I don’t think I see any other impact beyond that,” he explained.
“Of course, some of our competitors may have had some problems with that. It is not our case. So far, everything is fine. “Things are going well,” he noted.
In addition, he commented that despite all this, Stellantis is not going to change its supply strategy since supplies from the Far East are key to obtaining cheap electric cars.
“Western consumers (…) want affordable BEVs. Anything that can guarantee a better price will be exactly in place of what we should do,” she stated.
During the coming months it will be possible to see the impact that the situation has on the group’s zero-emissions policy, which is at a key moment to put its cheap models on the market that compete with rivals from Chinese brands.