Luxury carmaker Rolls-Royce to switch to all-electric range by 2030

Rolls-Royce has joined the club of premium brands such as Volkswagen's Bentley and Jaguar's Land Rover to commit to the manufacturing of only electric vehicles by 2030. It also recently teased its all-electric vehicle Spectre and aims to bring it to the market in the fourth quarter of 2023, said a Reuters report.

The CEO of Rolls-Royce Torsten Muller-Otvos mentioned that with this new EV, the company shows its strong resolution towards electrification. “With this new product we set out our credentials for the full electrification of our entire product portfolio by 2030," he was quoted saying in the report. He also added that by then Rolls-Royce will no longer produce or sell any products constituting internal combustion engines (ICE).

Though Rolls-Royce seems determined to put a date to attain its electrification goals, its parent company BMW has still not given a specific year by which it plans to stop manufacturing ICE products. In a recent interview by Automotive News that was reported by Carscoops, BMW development chief Frank Weber stated that conversion of combustion engines into electric ones should not be the only goal as a robust infrastructure for these EVs is also needed. “For electric mobility, the question is not when the combustion engine is ending. The question is: When is the system ready to absorb all those battery-electric vehicles? It’s about charging infrastructure, renewable energy. Are people ready? Is the system ready? Is the charging infrastructure ready? All of that," he said.

Weber also stressed that the Bavarian automaker is focusing on a smoother transitioning process from ICE vehicles to electric vehicles so that its social and economic aspects work in harmony. “It has also to do with the fact that I have people working for me on combustion engines and I’m shifting them over time into electric. It makes no sense to make the transition overnight. I have to make sure that this transition works perfectly – for both social reasons and economic reasons. These are real big questions," he added.

Even if BMW seems hesitant to commit to a specific year by which it aims to produce only EVs, its subsidiary Mini had said in March it will go all-electric by the end of the decade.

(With inputs from Reuters)