General Motors will end production of its first long-range battery-electric vehicles, the Chevrolet Bolt EV and Bolt EUV, at the end of the year.
The announcement comes at a point when the two models are reporting record sales and helping GM to become second only to Tesla in the U.S. EV market. But the move was not entirely unexpected, as the automaker is transitioning to a new generation of EVs, including all-electric versions of its Chevy Blazer, Equinox and Silverado models.
“We have progressed so far that it’s now time to plan to end the Chevrolet Bolt EV and EUV production,” GM Chairman and CEO Mary Barra said during an earnings call on Monday morning.
First launched in 2016, Bolt served as GM’s first serious entry into the battery-electric market, and underscored CEO Barra’s pronouncement the automaker will switch entirely to all-electric technology by 2035.
Leaving in style
The two versions of the Bolt will go out with a bang, rather than a whimper, GM expecting to produce about 70,000 of them this year. That will position Bolt as the third best-selling EV nameplate in the country, behind Tesla’s Model Y SUV and Model 3 sedan. It helped that Chevy slashed the price of the two Bolt models for this year. And now, with the $7,500 in federal tax credits available to Bolt buyers, an entry level model can be purchased for just under $20,000 before factoring in delivery fees.
Bolt’s strong sales mark a sharp comeback for a product line that was out of production for several months after a series of battery fires were reported in late 2021. GM and its South Korean partner LG Chem had to make numerous revisions to Bolt’s battery pack design before relaunching production early last year.
But Bolt was expected to have a limited future, even with those upgrades. The two versions of the subcompact EV use an older, proprietary vehicle architecture and battery design. GM’s new battery-electric vehicles use an entirely different set of platforms and batteries.
Once production of the Bolt EV and EUV models ends, the automaker will make major updates to its EV plant in Orion Township, Michigan for those new products, Barra added noting that, “When Orion EV assembly reopens in 2024 and reaches full production, employment will nearly triple and we’ll have a company-wide capacity to build 600,000 electric trucks annually.”
New platform for new generation
The new Ultium platform and batteries will be used in dozens of different EV models GM plans to launch by mid-decade, including several already in production, including the GMC Hummer EV and the Cadillac Lyriq. The automaker is preparing to launch production of the Silverado EV pickup this quarter. And the EV versions of the Blazer and Equinox will follow late in the year. An all-electric version of the GMC Sierra is set to follow in 2024.
“As we scale EVs, we will lower fixed costs and will continue to drive margin improvements,” Barra said during the earnings call.
The challenge for GM will be to accelerate production of its next-generation EV models. It debuted its Ultium technology with a limited-volume version of the Hummer and has so far built only about 2,000 of the new Lyriq models this year, Barra noted, even though it has been on sale since last year.
GM has not disclosed the reasons behind the slow rollout of the Lyriq, though speculation has focused on problems at the new Ultium battery plant opened last year in Lordstown, Ohio.
But the pace of production is expected to accelerate up as early bugs are worked out — and as GM boosts EV capacity. Along with the Orion EV assembly line, it will build passenger vehicles in Detroit and Spring Hill, Tennessee. A Canadian assembly line, meanwhile, is now producing delivery vans for GM’s commercial vehicle arm, BrightDrop.
To provide enough batteries for the estimated 1 million EVs GM plans to produce annually in the U.S., the automaker also is expanding its battery production capacity. It has just announced its fourth Ultium battery plant, part of a new alliance with South Korea’s Samsung SDI. Specific details, including the plant’s location, have yet to be announced, but the two companies will spend about $3 billion to bring it online.