GM is rescheduling its reveal of the GMC Hummer EV, an electric version of “super truck.”
The debut, originally scheduled for May 20, was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic, the company announced Wednesday, April 29.
GM hasn’t said when the reveal of the GMC-branded EV will now take place. The Hummer’s delay is the latest hit electric vehicles have taken as the coronavirus pandemic upends the industry. On Tuesday, Ford announced it wasn’t going forward with its plan to add an all-electric SUV, powered by Rivan, to its Lincoln model lineup.
Rumors about GM’s electric Hummer circulated for months, before the company announced the truck with a Super Bowl ad in February of this year.
The vehicle will have 1,000 horsepower and 11,500 pound-feet of torque. The company has been coy about exactly how the vehicle will look; the May event was supposed to be the big reveal.
Commercials, including one featuring LeBron James, have touted the new Hummer as a “quiet revolution.” The original Hummers were infamous gas-guzzlers. While we know the new version will go from 0 to 60 in three seconds, we don’t yet know how efficient it will be.
GM’s Detroit-Hamtramck factory will build the GMC Hummer EV, and the company has planned to invest $2.2 billion to upgrade it to become the first GM factory dedicated to electric vehicles.
The debut of the Hummer, as well as Rivian’s electric pickup truck and SUV, Ford’s F-150, and the Tesla Cybertruck seemed to hint that EVs were poised to appeal to a wider demographic. But fears of a recession, low oil prices, social distancing measures, and a mixture of other factors have driven speculation that electric vehicles’ breakthrough could be postponed.
BYD has launched the third-generation Qin Plus DM-i in China, and the first thing that caught my eye is its price. According to CarNewsChina, the plug-in hybrid sedan starts at 79,900 yuan, which is about $11,980. That’s an incredibly low price for a brand-new car, especially by US standards.
What’s even more impressive is the range. The Qin Plus DM-i can drive up to 137 miles on electricity alone, which should cover most people’s daily commutes without using a drop of gas. Once the battery runs out, the 1.5-liter engine takes over. Thanks to its 17-gallon tank and roughly 91 mpg with a drained battery, the combined range reaches up to 1,423 miles.
Apple won the PC market’s worst quarter, but that’s not the entire story. It won the race by stumbling less than everyone else.
PC makers shipped just 57 million computers worldwide in Q3, which might look good, but it’s a 21% year-over-year plunge (via Counterpoint Research). And despite Apple’s Mac shipments falling by 11%, to 5.6 million, its market share rose from 8.7% to 9.8%. How did that happen?
Update (October 22 23:54 PT): In response to our query, GM clarified that offline recording support is already available on eligible vehicles. Like Tesla's Sentry Mode, it requires owners to connect a USB drive to save incident recordings, which can be viewed on the vehicle's infotainment screen. The upcoming Connected Cameras feature will build on this by giving owners remote access to these recordings via the revamped OnStar app, allowing them to check footage without walking out to their car.
General Motors has announced plans to add a new Connected Cameras feature to its OnStar service starting next year, giving drivers a way to monitor parked vehicles remotely and capture footage of certain incidents.