Daimler to accelerate shift to electric vehicles

Daimler AG is pressing ahead with its structural realignment and accelerating its shift towards electric mobility with the aim of turning its full offering CO2-neutral as quickly as possible.

In a press release on Wednesday after its virtual regular Annual Meeting, the carmaker announced that Daimler Trucks & Buses would focusing on CO2-neutral passenger and goods transportation with series production of the eActros set to start in fall of 2021.

The eActros LongHaul was being developed meanwhile to cover longer distances, including ranges of about 500 kilometers, with market launch expected in 2024.

That was in addition to fuel-cell trucks which were scheduled to go into full-scale production in the second half of the decade.

The eCitaro and the articulated eCitaro buses were already available for CO2-neutral urban transport.

“We want to accelerate the electrification of our product portfolio. Almost two years ago, we presented our Ambition2039. We want a CO2-neutral fleet of new cars. It’s our goal to reach this target sooner,” said Ola Källenius, Chairman of the Board of Management of Daimler AG and of Mercedes-Benz AG.

Nevertheless, the shift to electric mobility required an efficient public charging infrastructure and to keep up with the ramp-up in production of auto manufacturers.

Case in point, Europe needed three million public charging points by the end of the decade and currently there was not even a tenth of that number, said Källenius.

Daimler was also involved in projects for improving electrification technologies and making electric vehicle charging more convenient for drivers.

Tied to the above, the German firm was a shareholder of Digital Charging Solutions GMbH (DCS), together with BMW and BP.

DCS already offered access to 228,000 charging points in 32 countries and the addition of BP was expected to provide DCS customers access to an additional 8,700 charging points across Europe including ultra-fast charging (more than 150kw) and develop new integrated offers for fleets (including fuel and charge) as a first step.

Daimler also said in the press release that it intended to spin off Daimler Truck and to pursue a public listing by the end of the year. The planned spin-off would be voted on at an Extraordinary Shareholder’s Meeting planned for the fall of 2021.

The manufacturer also said that it was confident about the current financial year. Based on the anticipated market development and the current assessments of the divisions, unit sales, revenue and EBIT in 2021 were still expected to be significantly above their prior-year levels.