This year, General Motors will phase out the not-too-successful Bolt EV and Bolt EUV electric vehicles, but US corporation CEO Mary Barra hinted that the story of Bolt will not end there.
The Chevrolet Bolt EV debuted in 2016 in a compact van format (some call it a high hatchback) – this, to put it mildly, is not the most popular body type in the United States, and in Europe, buyers' interest in family monocabs had already begun to fade by that time (in Europe, Chevrolet The Bolt EV was marketed as the Opel Ampera-e). Nevertheless, the model was warmly received by the press due to the objectively good ratio of price and power reserve on a single charge at that time. In 2019, the Bolt EV has been upgraded, with a range on a single charge increased from 383 to 417 km on the EPA cycle.
Current Chevrolet Bolt EV 1/3 Current Chevrolet Bolt EV 2/3 Current Chevrolet Bolt EV 3/3
In 2021, the Bolt EV underwent a restyling and acquired a platform relative – the Bolt EUV crossover with a slightly more attractive body and identical technical stuffing. In the same year, GM was forced to conduct a massive recall of all versions of the Bolt due to a defective LG battery and the risk of spontaneous combustion, in August, production and sales of the Bolt were stopped. At the beginning of 2022, there were rumors in the American media that Bolt would not return, because GM was moving full steam ahead to the production of third-generation electric vehicles (Bolt EV and Bolt EUV belong to the second), but they were wrong.
In April 2022, GM resumed production of the Bolt EV and Bolt EUV at the Orion Assembly plant in Michigan, and in the same year the family achieved the best sales in its history with 38,120 units sold in the US, up 53.5% more than in 2021 Bolt is doing even better this year with 19,700 units sold in the first quarter
Current Chevrolet Bolt EUV 1/3 Current Chevrolet Bolt EUV 2/3 Current Chevrolet Bolt EUV 3/3
It would seem that in the seventh year of its life, Bolt has finally come to success, but sales growth is largely due to large discounts (about $ 5,000): now Bolt EV costs $ 26,500 in the US, Bolt EUV – from $ 27,800. Evil tongues say that GM sells the Bolt EV and Bolt EUV almost at their cost or even at a loss, but this information cannot be verified. In any case, despite rising sales, last spring GM warned dealers that production of the Bolt EV and Bolt EUV would soon end and that orders would be stopped until the summer, the last copies will roll off the assembly line in the third quarter of this year or a little later.
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The hasty exit of the Bolts from the market is due to the fact that sales of the Chevrolet Equinox EV compact crossover should begin next fall – this is already a third-generation electric vehicle, it is based on the Ultium modular platform, which is much more advanced and cost-effective than the BEV II platform on which the Bolt EV and Bolt EUV. The base Equinox EV will cost around $30,000, which is less than the base Bolt EV without discounts. >Mary Barra in front of the Chevrolet Equinox EV
In the spring, after GM's introductions about the imminent end of Bolt production, Americans for the second time began to say goodbye to this model and write obituaries, but again in vain: GM CEO Mary Barra, in a fresh interview with NPR Marketplace podcast host Kai Rysdall, said that Bolt is a very important model for the corporation and she has a lot of fans, Mary Barra herself rides a Bolt, but this model has to be discontinued because her BEV II platform is outdated and is giving way to the Ultium platform. In essence, this means that the Bolt needs a platform change and may return in a few years as a new generation of budget electric vehicles.
In addition, General Motors and Honda announced the expansion of the prisoner in 2020, the alliance is precisely in the direction of joint development of low-cost electric vehicles. The first electric trains from the new budget range will hit the market in 2027, and one of them will most likely be the new Bolt, which will probably cost even less than the current one with discounts.
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