GM to end production of its most successful and lowest cost EV

General Motors (GM) has announced that it will stop the production of its most successful electric car so far. The Chevrolet Bolt EV will be phased out later this year when vehicles designed with GM’s next-generation Ultium platform gain production momentum.

“We have progressed so far that it’s now time to plan to end the Chevrolet Bolt EV and EUV production, which will happen at the very end of the year,” GM CEO Mary Barrs said on the company’s Q1 earnings call this week

This will make way for other vehicles to be produced at the same location. The Chevrolet Bolt is currently produced at GM’s Orion Plant in Michigan. 

The same plant will start to produce GM’s other larger trucks, not necessarily the EV trucks GM has been developing:

“[The Plant] will be retooled in preparation for the production of Chevy Silverado and GMC Sierra trucks”

The significance of the Chevrolet Bolt is huge for GM. Last year, nearly 98% of the 39,096 electric cars GM produced were Bolt EVs. That’s 38,120 of them.

The remainder consisted of 854 GMC Hummer EVs pickup trucks and 122 Cadillac Lyriq SUVs.

More recently in Q1 2023, GM produced 20,670 EVs with the Chevrolet Bolt EV making up 19,700 of them.

It appears to be a strange move by GM, particularly as the Chevrolet Bolt is one of the very few affordable EVs in the US market. With the production ceasing later in 2023, it could have an impact the EV market.

The Chevrolet Bolt starts at $US27,495, so there aren’t many EVs coming close to that price point. 

A 147 kW motor that powers the wheels is fed by 65 kWh battery pack that can deliver up to 417 km of range on the EPA cycle. The EPA cycle reveals a more closer to the real-world driving range than the WLTP cycle figures used in Australia.

Nissan Leaf is also similarly sized and priced but its sales have dropped in the US significantly as well. In the first Quarter of 2023 when the Chevrolet Bolt sold 19,700 EVs, the Nissan Leaf made up 2,354 sales.

Given many Chinese car companies like BYD who are making affordable EVs, aren’t really being welcomed with open arms in the US market, affordable EVs may not hit the ground running anytime soon after the Bolt’s departure.

That’s until Tesla starts the production of its next-generation low-cost Model which is announced at the company’s Investors Day earlier this year.

Until then, the next affordable EV option may come in the form of the Chevrolet Equinox EV which will be priced above the Bolt but will start at $US30,000. This would be built of the company’s Ultium Platform and is expected to go into production later this year.

Lets hope GM can ramp up the production of this new model much faster than the Caddilac Lyriq if it has any chance to sell a similar number of the Chevrolet Equinox EVs as it did with the cheap and cheerful Chevrolet Bolt EV.