Aton Martin announced the creation of its new luxury EV brand, Lagonda, during the Geneva Auto Show earlier this year with the unveiling of its Vision Concept model. The British automaker provided further insight into the new brand this week announcing that the first car from the stable would be an electric Luxury SUV, pictured below, to be unveiled in 2021. Aston Martin added that the Lagonda SUV EV would be built around near-future technologies including an advanced battery system leading one to speculate that the Lagonda SUV will use a solid state battery. The Lagonda SUV is expected to reach the market in 2022.

Aston Martin surprised at the Geneva Motor Show with its new Lagonda Vision Concept EV Lagonda will be the British automakers zero emission luxury brand. Production on the Lagonda will start in 2021and a second model will be developed by 2023. Othe designs showed based on the Lagonda Vision is a Coupe and an SUV. Far more than any orthodox design, the Lagonda Vision Concept was designed from the inside out because that is what the architecture allows. With no need to package a vast internal combustion engine, gearbox, and transmission, Lagonda’s designers could optimize the interior down to the smallest detail and then build up the exterior of the car around it. The Lagonda Vision Concept doesn’t have a bonnet because one is not required. But it still needs to travel through the air and to do so as efficiently as possible to preserve battery life, which is why its shape is so sleek and dynamic. The Lagonda Vision Concept has been configured to accept powerful solid state electric batteries enabling it to cover up to 400 real-world miles between charges.

A year after Aston Martin‘s disastrous partnership with LeEco the British automaker is returning to China shopping for new partnerships. The failed partnership with LeEco, owner of Faraday Future, caused the delay of the delivery of Aston Martin’s first EV, the RapidE, from 2018 to 2019. In an interview with Bloomberg the CEO of Aston Martin, Andy Palmer, indicated that Aston Martin is not looking to produce EVs with its badge for the Chinese market but rather to collaborate on materials and technologies to improve the performance of its EVs. To this end, Aston Martin announced a 5-year trade and investment drive worth $860 million (£600 million). Palmer further indicated that it is considering using China’s largest battery maker, CATL, as the supplier for the RapidE. CATL this week raised $2 billion in a bid to become the worlds largest battery maker for EVs.

Hopefully, Aston Martin learned something from its misadventures with LeEco as its investments in the EV sector could only see returns from 2025.

After the breakdown of the Aston Martin / LeEco JV Aston Martin had to go back to drawing board on the development of the RapidE. The company this week confirmed the new launch date as 2019.

The controversial LeEco announced the groundbreaking of its plant in the city of Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province China. LeEco is entwined between Faraday Future and the LeSee electric vehicle manufactured by LeEco. Both companies were founded by Chinese businessman Jia Yueting. Both businesses are known for making bold statements and big-ticket announcements just to be followed by press reports of cash flow and funding problems. The announcement comes at a time when Faraday Future is battling to break ground on its plant in Northern Los Angeles. The company could not even pay the $21 million deposit to Aecon despite being offered $300 million by the local authorities for building the assembly plant there. LeEco has also partnered with Aston Martin on the RapidE, where it will help with the development of the zero emission technology. Faraday Future is said to hold the patents to the technology, but recent reports state that the technology is in fact held by a separate company in the Cayman Islands, creating insecurity for investors and borrowers.