Stellantis' "Dare Forward 2030 Plan"

Stellantis has revealed its “Dare Forward 2030” plan at its Strategy Day earlier this week. Among other things the company wants to achieve by 2030:

• Global BEV (battery electric vehicle) sales of five million units, reaching 100% of passenger car BEV sales in Europe, and 50% passenger cars and light-duty trucks in the U.S.
  
  
• Introduce 75 BEVs, “including the Jeep brand’s first 100% battery-electric SUV launching in early 2023, followed by the Ram ProMaster BEV later in 2023 and the Ram 1500 BEV pickup truck in 2024”
  
  
• Double global net revenues to 300 billion euros
  
  
• Cut carbon emissions by 50% (and go carbon net zero by 2038)

While many manufacturers are going all-in on the EV transformation, CEO Carlos Tavares (see photo below) says key to the change is "the two major pillars" of electrification and software, which is very new for the legacy automakers, but areas that they must invest in to compete.

Tavares is a realist, however, and doesn't discount the value of the legacy ICE (internal combustion engine) business.

"It is absolutely true, that we are funding the investments for electrification with the money coming from the [ICE business]," Tavares says. "That's absolutely true. That's exactly what we want, that's why we can put $35 billion on the table."

Automakers need to be smart, according to Tavares, because in order to effect change the industry has to look at costs, not just for the automakers, but for middle class car buyers across the globe. And that means replacing older, dirtier cars with newer vehicles that may still use gas engines but emit less than half the pollutants and cost much cheaper than EVs at the moment.

Compromise in that regard is one position for Tavares. The other position, where fossil fuels are completely banned, isn't something Tavares is ready to accept yet.

"Dogmatism has taken the lead, rather than thinking and looking at what is the best deal for the society," Tavares says. "The number of EVs you are going to be able to sell is very much driven by the household income of people that can pay a higher price for the EVs... The global warming issue is limited by the household income per capita, which then if you don't complement this strategy with a strategy where you take the clunkers out of the road, and replaced by modern vehicles, even if they are less electrified, but you keep their affordability, then you are missing something."