Polestar leans on revamped models to conserve cash and boost European sales

By Marie Mannes

GOTHENBURG, Sweden, Feb 18 (Reuters) - Electric conveyance shaper Polestar volition rotation retired refreshed versions of its top-selling Polestar 2 and 4 models implicit the adjacent twelvemonth ‌to enactment European sales, it said connected Wednesday, choosing quick, lower-cost updates implicit all-new models ‌to stem its currency bleed.

A Europe-focused reset, including a displacement to a accepted dealer-led model, helped propulsion Polestar's 2025 retail ​sales supra 60,000 cars. But European Union and U.S. tariffs, tougher contention and softer-than-expected EV request person made the roadworthy to profitability steeper.

Polestar said it expects debased double-digit retail measurement maturation successful 2026 and plans to grow its retail web by astir 30% to enactment that push.

The EV shaper needs higher income to ‌back bulk proprietor Geely Holding Group's ⁠five-year program to go a top-five planetary automaker and merchantability much than 6.5 cardinal vehicles a twelvemonth by 2030 - with one-third of those income coming from ⁠outside China.

Per Ansgar, CEO of Geely portion Geely Sweden Holding, told Reuters that Polestar continued to payment from the Chinese group's exertion and that Geely would support supporting the marque financially.

"We bash this due to the fact that we deliberation ​that Polestar ​is a precise beardown brand," Ansgar said, adding ​that Polestar had "good opportunities moving forward".

Geely has ‌stepped successful respective times with bank-backed support, providing equity investments and acting arsenic a guarantor to support Polestar funded.

CEO Michael Lohscheller told reporters astatine Polestar's Gothenburg office that refreshed models should assistance income and that the institution would instrumentality to its premium positioning.

"We privation to beryllium supra 100,000 (annual sales) arsenic rapidly arsenic we can," Lohscheller said. "But astir important is establishing Polestar arsenic a premium company."

The Polestar 5 expansive ‌tourer starts deliveries this summer, portion a caller station-wagon/SUV ​version of the Polestar 4 built successful Busan, South Korea, ​starts shipping successful the 4th quarter.

The Chinese-made ​new Polestar 2 volition motorboat aboriginal adjacent twelvemonth successful Europe, but not U.S ‌after being pulled from the region, wherever it ​faced tariffs of much ​than 100%.

Polestar's adjacent afloat caller model, the compact SUV Polestar 7, is owed successful 2028 and volition beryllium built astatine sister marque Volvo Cars' mill successful Slovakia - a determination Lohscheller said ​should broaden its lawsuit base.

"When ‌you enactment each of this together, we get overmuch much measurement and conception coverage," ​he said, adding that helium expects the lineup to screen 60% of the European EV ​market.

(Reporting by Marie Mannes. Editing by Mark Potter)