How Polestar will race away from Volvo’s shadow

Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath believes that the brand’s decision to make the Precept full-electric grand tourer is crucial to establishing the Volvo subsidiary’s own identity.

"With the Polestar Precept nobody will ask me anymore, 'Will you always stay that close to Volvo'?" Ingenlath told Automotive News Europe. "It's so clear that that is a car that you would not have within the Volvo brand."

That was not the case with the Polestar 1 and Polestar 2, which started out as Volvo projects. Both were transferred to Polestar after it was turned into a stand-alone brand three years ago to quickly give it products to sell.

The low-volume Polestar 1, a high-performance plug-in hybrid, debuted last year and the Polestar 2, a mass-market full-electric compact that is a direct rival to the Tesla Model 3, is being rolled out in Europe, the U.S. and China now.

The lineup will be expanded to add an SUV, the Polestar 3. Then will come the production version of the Precept, which Ingenlath said will be in development for another three years.