French automaker Renault is hoping it has a winner on its hands with the upcoming Renault 5 BEV, which the company says already has 50,000 orders on the waitlist just a few days after its debut at the Geneva Motor Show.
The new compact electric vehicle, which officially goes on sale in May in Europe, starts at €25,000, about $27,130, which is thousands of euros cheaper than most competitors. Built in Northern France, the retro-inspired vehicle is Renault’s first all-new small EV since the famous Zoe hit the scene in 2014.
“We have a waiting list of 50,000 people,” Renault brand CEO Fabrice Cambolive told Automotive News Europe. “We will open orders in May, and we’ll start to deliver cars in September or October.” He also added that in 2023, 50% of Renault’s sales were retail and 50% were fleet, so he is expecting that 40% of Renault 5 sales will be fleet as well.
The 5 E-Tech will become available in three different electric motor configurations, offering 70 kW, 90 kW, or 110 kW of power, and its max battery size of 52 kWh will deliver a WLTP range of up to 400 km (249 miles). It can even tow a trailer with a capacity of up to 500kg. The Renault 5 will also be available with a smaller battery at 40 kWH, with a 300 km range, but Cambolive says that version will launch a few months after the larger one. Two color options include Pop Yellow and Pop Green, as well as more classic options.
The new version of the Renault 5, which debuted last week at the Geneva Motor Show, is set to rival the Fiat 500e and Mini Electric, targeting the trendy, upmarket driver of small EVs, putting it one step above in price point to Renault’s recently revealed Twingo.
Cambolive told Automotive News Europe that the brand aims to bring its Zoe drivers over to the Renault 5, but doesn’t see the car in direct competition to the Clio, the second-best-selling car in Europe last year, which is available in a hybrid version but not all-electric.
“The ICE cars we are selling are mostly full-hybrid, so they are very efficient,” he said. “Regarding our EV strategy, we are going to continue our progress on cutting costs and transfer some of the gains to the cost of the car to have more competitiveness in the future. But even more than that, after launching two EVs in the C-segment [the Scenic and Megane compacts], we will make the shift to EVs in the B-segment thanks to the Renault 5 and the Renault 4 [a small SUV due in 2025.] The biggest volumes in the shift will come in the B-segment.”
In January, Renault canceled its planned IPO for its EV spinoff Ampere. While the IPO was scheduled for the first part of this year with an expected valuation of up to €10 billion ($10.47 billion), Renault says that market conditions aren’t optimal to make the move. Still, Ampere is offering a total of seven models by 2031: the electric Mégane E-Tech, Scenic, R5 and R4, and the new low-cost Twingo, which should cost less than €20,000 ($22,000).
Last week, Renault confirmed that it is in talks with Volkswagen to build a BEV minicar for the European market.
Renault plans to go purely electric by 2030 – and with the French government holding a 15% stake in the company.
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