Holden Ute EV would be "as cheap or cheaper" as fuel-powered rivals

GM's top executive has shed more light on the brand's electric ute plans, revealing its first EV pick-up truck will be as cheap or cheaper than it's fuel-powered rivals, but no less capable.

That's the word from GM president, and former Holden MD, Mark Reuss, who told Bloomberg that the company was focused on solving the key problems facing electric utes. 

His comments follow those made at a transport conference in New York, where he said that a range of GM EVs would be based on the brand's Autonomy platform. Reuss confirmed GM would sell an electric ute from 2024, which will compete with battery-electric trucks from Tesla, Rivian and Ford.

Whether the GM ute will make its way to Australia as a Holden remains to be seen, with the brand's local arm saying the timeframe given by Mr Reuss is too far off to comment on. 

Either way, there is still work to be done, Reuss says. Not least of which on super-fast charging, which can degrade the battery cells, and on charging infrastructure in general. 

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Perhaps most important, though, Reuss says a GM EV ute will be "cost parity or less" when compared to the brand's traditional pick-up line-up.

"If you look at battery-electric pick-up trucks, you've got to solve a couple of things," he says. "Number one is charge time. You've got to be able to get out of the lithium-ion plating that happens when we dump a whole lot of energy into a battery cell, so the industry is working on that," he says.

"You’ve got to be able to have a charge structure that’s relatively benign. In other words, if we were able to have an electric charging infrastructure that’s similar to gasoline.

"Thirdly, they have to be cost parity or less. No one is going to pay more for a battery electric pick-up truck for work or primary use, so you have to get the cell cost right for sure."

In what appears to be a veiled swipe at key rivals Tesla and Rivian, Reuss says that while some products might be able to accelerate quickly or be capable off-road, GM's EV ute will be a genuine workhorse able to tick every box a pick-up truck should.

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"At the end of the day, a lot of people earn a living with these, and they’re relatively inexpensive to operate," he says.

"In the end, the customer has to buy something that is high value, so you have to have the towing capacity and all the things that make a pick-up truck the standard of using something to make a living.

"That’s the high-volume part of the pick-up truck segment. Plenty of people will make trucks that are more in the luxury or high-end segment. They might be great off-road, or they might be fast or handle great.

"But when it comes to hauling things for a long distance reliably, it’s really hard. I wish I knew exactly when it would happen, but I don't."

Would you be in the queue for an electric Holden Ute? Tell us in the comments below.