Polestar’s new 4 EV illustrated for CAR by Andrei Avarvarii
The Polestar 4: this side profile picture was shown to investors
Three new Polestars by 2025: the 5 sedan (left), 4 SUV (middle) and larger 3 SUV (right)
The Polestar 3 (left) and 4 (right) are a pair of new, all-electric SUVs
Thomas Ingenlath, Polestar CEO
► Polestar 4 takes aim at Porsche Macan► One of two new all-electric SUVs
► Priced from £47k, launched in 2023
Polestar has quietly announced some new details of its new 4. The new Polestar 4 will be a coupe SUV and will join the range ranks in 2023.
The Scandi brand is building significant momentum with a few new models incoming over the next two years, with the 4 notching Polestar’s SUV offerings up to two.
Very little other details are known about the car other than an image of the 4 under a cloth (below), parked between the new Polestar 3 SUV and upcoming Polestar 5 four-door.
But the brand is already confident about it and the 3’s upcoming success, with head of global sales Mike Whittington boasting that the brand has capacity to build more than 160,000 of these two EVs by 2025. ‘With both Polestar 3 and 4 on the horizon, we are set to play a leading role in the electrification of the lucrative and sizeable premium SUV segments.’ Watch out Audi Q4 e-Tron.
CEO Thomas Ingenlath has confirmed the name, pricing and details to CAR magazine as the company announced its plan to float on the Nasdaq.
Investment specialists The Gores Group and Guggenheim Capital have provided funding to take Polestar public, valuing the business at $20 billion (£15bn). Crucially, the deal will inject the funds to accelerate the expansion of Volvo’s EV offshoot, including the Polestar 4 and two other incremental models.
The CEO on the new Polestar 4
‘We have a second SUV in our pipeline,’ Ingenlath revealed. ‘It will compete below the Polestar 3’s €75,000 [£65k] sector, it is slightly smaller. It will not compromise on the interior length, but this car is slightly more ground-hugging, a bit more of the coupe-type roofline.
‘The Polestar 4 really brings the greatness of the brand to a segment that will, eventually, start around €55,000 [£47k], where we in some point in time want to reach with the Polestar 4. This is the [price] spectrum we will cover with these two cars.’
Documents shared with investors reveal that the Polestar 4 is forecast to leapfrog the 2 by mid-decade to become the company’s bestseller, with 79,000 annual sales projected, a whisker ahead of the liftback saloon.
Globally, the mid-sized premium sport SUV sector is expected to grow by 46% by 2025, making this a ripe hunting ground for Polestar and others.
Ingenlath (above) pledged that aerodynamics would play a major part in the brand’s SUVs in future, claiming that the days of big, boxy off-roaders were over.
But each car will have ‘different shapes and silhouettes, different interiors… and with Polestar drivetrains, which make them very, very powerful.’ The company is developing a 450kW e-motor, as well as hands-off autonomous driving skills due within two years.
What else do we know about the Polestar 4?
The smaller, more affordable Polestar SUV will maintain the performance drivetrain now associated with the brand, even though it is based on a different group EV architecture dubbed PMA by Polestar (echoing its genetic roots in Volvo’s CMA platform).
The same hardware is called the Sustainable Experience Architecture (SEA) by parent company Geely, which claims this is the world’s first open-source electric vehicle platform. The Polestar 4 will be built at Geely’s Hangzhou Bay factory in China, with production slated to start before the end of 2023.
The boss also confirmed that the third new model would, logically, be the Polestar 5, trailed by the Precept. It means Polestar will launch one new model every year until 2025, by which time sales are projected to rise tenfold from this year’s output to 290,000 vehicles a year.
Keyword: Polestar 4: CAR's debrief on 2023's Swedish Macan rival