Toyota (Finally) Launches Pure BEV

Just two weeks after the company basically said it wasn’t interested in a pure electric future, Toyota has announced the BZ4X battery electric car. This will go on sale in European markets early in 2022. 

BZ4X? What’s in a Name? 

It seems that Toyota isn’t interested in sexing up its pure electric range of cars either with a name like this. It is an abbreviation that means ‘Beyond Zero’ with the 4 being the model number (of 25 set to be released) and the X signalling the car is a crossover SUV. 

Skateboard Platform 

As with so many new EVs hitting the showrooms, Toyota is using a ‘skateboard’ platform with the motors and battery in a unit under the floor of the car. This has many advantages in that the weight is low and makes for better driving. It developed this platform alongside Subaru which plans to release an estate car in reasonably short order. 

Steering will be drive-by-wire with no physical link between the steering wheel and wheels. In some markets the steering wheel will be replaced with a yoke that was in the BZ concept car, which they say will prevent drivers from moving their hands around the wheel.   

Range and Performance 

Range and performance aren’t the most exciting. Expect acceleration on the dual motor, AWD car in the range of 7.5 seconds which won’t exactly give you whiplash or a thrill like a Model 3. Range on the AWD version will be 280 miles with its 71.4kWh battery pack and this will be able to be charged at 150kW on CCS. 

Not a Car to Change the World 

The biggest car company in the world in terms of global sales volumes has released an uninspiring, middle of the range EV.  It won’t compete hard with the biggest car maker in the world  in terms of market capitalisation - Tesla, which has been recently valued at over a trillion US dollars. 

Why could this be? The Japanese car giant seems to be reluctant to join the race to go fully zero emissions. It was even part of the legal push in the US, supported by Donald Trump, to prevent California from banning fossil fuel cars until recently. 

As with Trump, you can’t call the company bosses stupid. They may be small ‘c’ conservative and reluctant to jump into the fray of massive innovation and change as governments have ganged up to ban fossil fuel car sales. They are certainly hedging their bets by investing in hydrogen fuel cell cars (their home country Japan is big on hydrogen), something Elon Musk famously referred to as ‘fool cells’. 

Whatever their intent and plans, there is one certainty in capitalism - those that don’t make the right decisions and are unprepared for change will go under. We’ve seen that with UK high street retail chains unprepared for e-commerce and going under as a result. Could Toyota in hesitating be about to suffer such a fate? Only time will tell…