Julian Thompson is a car designer. In this segment, the host credits him with shaping the look of the first Lotus Elise, helping Jaguar’s design direction with the XF, and later setting up a GM design studio in Europe.
The Lotus Elise is a small, lightweight sports car made by Lotus. The speaker is saying the first Elise was designed by Julian Thompson and is still remembered for looking especially good.
The Jaguar Mark I is an older Jaguar car, built as a traditional four-door saloon. It’s known for its classic styling from that time period. The podcast mentions it because the speaker owned two and remembers it well.
The Jaguar XF is a Jaguar model in the “executive” car class—more of a grown-up sedan than a sports car. The speaker is saying it helped kick off a major new design style for Jaguar.
General Motors is a big car company that makes cars under several different brand names. Here, the speaker says GM hired Julian Thompson to help create a design studio in Europe.
Chevrolet is a major car brand owned by General Motors. The speaker is saying the design team could help influence how Chevrolet vehicles are designed.
They’re talking about a more experimental style approach—trying bolder, more future-looking ideas than usual. The key point is balancing “new” with things that still feel familiar to the brand’s fans.
The Chevrolet Corvette is a sports car made by Chevrolet. It’s known for being fast and for having a recognizable look. People talk about it a lot because it’s one of the brand’s most important performance cars.
The Corvette Stingray is a Corvette version/name that fans recognize. They’re saying the design used familiar Stingray cues so it still looked like a Corvette.
RPM means how many times the engine spins each minute. “10,000 RPM” means the engine is revving extremely high, which is a hallmark of performance engines built to spin fast.
Car
RS 200
The “RS 200” is discussed as a future model project that’s being planned as a better road car rather than a pure rally weapon. The key point here is that it’s positioned as a reinterpretation of a rally-derived idea—specifically avoiding a Group B rally-car approach while still leveraging the engineering credibility.
The RS200 is a special performance car connected to rally racing. It’s smaller and more focused than a typical road car, with the goal of strong performance. The podcast is mentioning it because they’re talking about making a new version inspired by that idea.
“Group B” was a high-profile rally racing category known for extremely powerful, lightweight cars and relatively permissive rules. Calling something a “Group B rally car” signals it was designed around rally competition demands—often at the expense of everyday road usability.
In limited-run or special-build cars, “serial numbers” are unique identifiers used to track each individual vehicle. The discussion suggests the project’s production plan may be tied to how many numbered cars can be built and how they’re allocated over time.
BMW’s “Neuerklasse” is basically BMW’s plan for a new kind of electric-car design. It’s the overall blueprint that affects how the battery and powertrain are arranged.
The BMW iX3 is an electric SUV. It’s based on the same general size and idea as an X3, but it runs on electricity. The podcast is mentioning it as an early car from BMW’s new EV platform, which is why it’s notable.
The BMW i3 is an electric car made by BMW. It’s designed to be efficient and easy to use for everyday driving. The podcast is comparing it with other BMW electric cars, especially regarding efficiency.
Anti-roll bars are parts that help stop the car from leaning too much in corners. If a car sits lower, it can often get away with smaller anti-roll bars because it doesn’t roll as easily.
“Saloon” just means a four-door sedan. The idea here is that sedans are usually lower and have less front surface area, which can help them cut through the air more efficiently.
The BMW M3 is a high-performance BMW that’s built to be fun to drive, not just get you from A to B. “Saloon” here means a four-door version, which affects how the car feels compared with a two-door.
Max Mussoni is mentioned as a key design leader at Polestar. The point is that he helped shape the look of the cars, including the interior and exterior style.
A manual transmission is a gearbox where the driver selects gears using a clutch pedal and gear lever. Here, they’re discussing whether an M3 can be had with a manual, which matters to enthusiasts because it changes how the car feels and how engaging it is to drive.
Depreciation just means how much a car’s price goes down over time. They’re saying these electric cars might have dropped in price already, so they could be a better buy now.
The Audi RS e-tron GT is a fast electric Audi. In this conversation, they’re talking about how its price may drop after people buy it new, meaning it could be a better deal later.
The Porsche Taycan is Porsche’s electric car. They say it drives like a Porsche—good steering and a comfortable ride—and that it still feels quick, even in earlier versions.
The Ford Mustang is a sports car from Ford. It’s known for being fun to drive and for having a lot of versions over the years. It’s also a common choice for racing, which is why it comes up in car discussions.
The Porsche 356 is an old-school Porsche sports car that looks like a classic. Here, the hosts say a new electric concept looks like a Porsche 356 on the outside, but the important stuff underneath is modern electric-car technology.
A “skateboard” architecture is an electric-car layout where the battery and motors are built into a flat base. Then you can put different car shapes on top of that same base.
CES is a big tech show in Las Vegas. Car companies sometimes show off new electric-car tech there because it’s where lots of tech news and attention happen.
Hub motors are electric motors built into the wheels. Instead of having a motor far away and sending power through a drivetrain, the motor is right in the wheel.
Term
solar state battery
They’re talking about a new type of battery they call a “solar state” battery. The takeaway is that it’s presented as a fresh battery idea for an electric vehicle concept.
“Going sideways” describes oversteer behavior where the car’s rear slips outward relative to the direction of travel. It’s a common enthusiast/rally driving description rather than a specific technical component.
The Peugeot 205 GTI is a classic sporty hatchback that car fans really like. Here it’s mentioned as part of the same “sports cars are the passion” theme.
Newquay is a town in Cornwall, England. The point here is that it’s not a typical place you’d associate with major motorsport, yet the person still drives like a rally fan.
The Renault 5 is a small car model from Renault. The podcast is talking about a version the speaker drove, and comparing it to another car. It’s mentioned because it’s a compact, everyday-style vehicle with a recognizable name.
The BMW i4 is an electric car with four doors. It’s designed to feel like a normal sedan, but powered by electricity. The podcast is referencing it because the speaker has driven it and is comparing it to another car.
The Fiat Panda is a small car meant for everyday use. People often choose it because it’s practical and simple to drive. In the podcast, it’s mentioned because the speaker has owned several of them in a row.
Stalantis is almost certainly Stellantis, a big car group made from a merger of two companies. The point here is that one person is responsible for marketing across many different car brands.
“Brink of disaster” just means a company was in serious trouble and could have failed. Here it’s being used to describe how leadership helped prevent a worst-case outcome.
Marchione is Sergio Marchionne, a key Fiat executive. The host is saying Fiat struggled during his time in charge, before the later merger into Stellantis.
Tavares is Carlos Tavares, a major auto executive involved with PSA and then Stellantis. The host is connecting his involvement to the merger and the tough times around it.
The Toyota Supra is a sports car designed to be quick and fun to drive. The podcast is talking about how it’s made with help from other companies, especially for the engine and related parts. That kind of collaboration can influence how the car performs.
The BMW 7 Series is BMW’s big, luxury flagship sedan. It’s the kind of car people use when they want a “serious” official-looking ride—quiet, comfortable, and upscale.
The Rolls-Royce Phantom is a very expensive luxury car. It’s designed to be extremely comfortable, especially for long drives. The podcast is talking about a Phantom version and what stood out about it.
The Bentley Flying Spur is a luxury sedan meant for very comfortable rear-seat travel. The hosts are saying it would be a better fit for official use because it’s designed for people to get in and out easily from the back.
The Isegolis trophy is a named award in the automotive world. In this episode, it’s described as the main prize being handed out, with Siemens involved.
The Lamborghini Urus is Lamborghini’s fast SUV. It’s the kind of car that lets people enjoy the Lamborghini brand without needing a low-slung sports car for everyday use.
Plug-in hybrids are cars that use both gas and electricity. You can charge them like an electric car, but they also have a gas engine for when you need it.
They’re talking about how many cars a luxury brand can sell before it stops feeling exclusive. The “10,000” number is used as a rule-of-thumb for that balance.
Ferrari Luce is a Ferrari electric car. In this segment, the big point isn’t the specs—it’s that people are reacting to its design with a lot more anger than you’d expect.
Shrinkflation is when the product gets smaller, but the price doesn’t drop. The host is saying people start to notice these gradual changes and get annoyed.
The salami effect is the idea that tiny changes don’t seem like much at first, but if you keep taking small slices, you end up with a big loss. The host is using it to explain why people eventually notice gradual declines.
“Puro Sangue” is Ferrari’s SUV. The speaker is joking/imagining what an electric version would be like and whether it would feel more exciting than a plain, unchanging design.
Term
five-spoke wheel
They’re talking about a wheel design with five spokes. The point is that the speaker thinks that wheel style doesn’t suit the car’s body shape.
In this context, “turbine” likely refers to a turbine-style design element or visual feature on the car, not the everyday idea of a generic fan. The speaker is contrasting the wheel styling with another design detail they think is more interesting.
The Citroën CX is an older, comfortable car from Citroën. The podcast is specifically calling out a higher-end version called the CX Prestige. The speaker seems to like how it looks and stands out.
Car
Citroen CX Prestige
The Citroën CX Prestige is a special, comfort-oriented version of the Citroën CX. People love the CX because it rides in a very smooth, distinctive way for its era.
Car
Alpha GTA
The Alfa Romeo GTA is a more track-focused version of an Alfa Romeo Giulia. It’s famous for being lighter and more fun to drive than the regular model.
The Lamborghini Countach is one of the most famous supercars ever made, known for its sharp, futuristic look. The LP 400 is an early version that many fans consider the classic one.
A body kit is extra exterior parts added to change how a car looks. It can make the car look more aggressive, but if it’s the wrong one it can ruin the original look.
The Dodge Charger 500 is a Charger variant from the classic muscle-car period. It’s the kind of model name that usually indicates a specific special trim or package from that era.
The Renault 5 Turbo is a fast version of the Renault 5. It uses a turbocharged engine, which helps it feel much quicker than a normal small hatchback.
LIVE
Hello, welcome to the AutoCAD podcast, and my week in class, we've got here Stephen
Cropley there and some cutlery in the background.
Yeah, yeah, great.
How's it going?
This is going to be an interesting one, isn't it?
Before we start, I'm going to tell you this podcast is brought to you in association with
our sponsor, Anderson, Anderson-EV.com, for design-focused premium electric car chargers,
and the Concierge Service will look after you if you visit their website.
Where are we today, Stephen Cropley?
Well we are in a place called the Honourable Artillery Company because it's the site of
the London Concourse and attached to the London Concourse in the first evening, I think first
evening.
No, third evening is the AutoCAD Awards, our dinner.
So we've got our award winners and about 80 guests in, and we're going to talk about
the successes of the last 12 months of the car business.
Yes, the AutoCAD Awards in partnership with Siemens is tonight.
By the time you listen to this, the winners will be in the magazine for a week.
We talked about it on the pod last week, there'll be some of the cars.
Yes, some of the cars.
That's right.
But there are some people winners too.
Do you want to run through a few?
Yeah.
We haven't spoken to them yet, so we may talk, because the plan was we were going to speak
after we've spoken to them, but we haven't yet, because we haven't seen them.
No, no, there are.
Our diaries don't go inside often today, so it's a bit of a nuisance, but anyway.
We can talk about them, not to them.
Yes, exactly.
Julian Thompson, design hero.
Well, as I think I said in the magazine, he could have won this half a dozen times,
I think.
He's had such a long and effective career, he started out as a Lotus, everybody knows,
he led the team that designed the very first Lotus Elise, which I think you could argue
is still the most, I suppose, the best looking, the Mark I, had two of them myself.
Then he went off to work for VW, then he joined Ian Cullum for 20 years at Jaguar, where
they jumped two generations and found a new look for Jaguar with the XF and the family
that bred, and then the cars afterwards.
He briefly had the top job for a couple of years, but Jaguar, as he's well known, had
a big rethink and he stepped out of that and was going to go freelance or retire or something,
and then very soon afterwards, less than six months later, he had a tap on the shoulder
from General Motors, who although they had left Europe, they decided that what they needed
was a studio in Europe.
So he was charged with setting up a place anywhere in Europe, he chose Warwick, he selected
the 35 people who work there now and they design everything, Hummer, Buick, Chevrolet,
all the stuff that GM makes, they have an opportunity to affect the design of all of
the GM Marks, a wonderful job, and of course, Julian's on top of it, just the right bloke
for the job.
Yeah, it's advanced design, isn't it?
Is that the thing?
What's the difference?
I wonder what the difference, I know you're not designing products necessarily for consumer
focus, but I'm interested in the difference in approach with advanced design to normal
design, can you be more challenging, can you be more outlandish?
I think you can.
Because you don't have to, your audience is slightly different.
Yeah, I think that's exactly the case.
They came to notice first when they proposed a Chevy Corvette, you remember that lovely
concept?
There were three, I think, or four commissioned around the world from various places, GM Studios,
but the one produced in the UK was for, was not the next, but the one after, that sort
of thing.
It was supposed to fasten on the things about Corvettes that were enduring, that would
make it a Corvette in an era that's perhaps a decade gone, and it was an EV, of course,
and a very interesting mid-engined car, but it was unmistakably a Corvette, that was the
cleverness of it, really good.
It had references to the Corvette Stingray, but nothing like a Corvette Stingray, but
you could still see the influences.
It's a mystery to me how car designers do this.
I don't get that, yeah, to make it look, you know that it's familiar, that there's something
entirely new, it's entirely new, but there's something familiar about it.
Yeah, and you ask them how they do it, and they say, I don't know, mate, we just do it.
It's just what we do.
On this object of design, we've just been looking outside the Ballroom Motorworks Mark
1 Escort.
Have you looked around that as well?
I did, yeah.
10,000 RPM, boy.
It's that car, you know, the RS 1800, sort of surgically rethought, isn't it, and you
know, built as though it was a Breitling or something, you know, a watch.
It is exquisite.
We've been invited up to go have a look around the place, and have maybe their technical director
or the designer, Wayne Burgess, on the podium.
Oh, that'll do that.
I ran into him briefly, because I guess we both knew him at Jaguar, didn't we, but he
seems to have his hands full, because they're not only that car, but a year's time, they're
going to do their own version of the RS 200.
Remember the four-wheel drive little sort of sub-supercar thing?
Yeah, it's a Group B rally car, I was just speaking to Simon, the technical guy there,
and he said, you know, we're not going to make a Group B rally car, because there's
loads of those, but the RS 200 was a rubbish road car, so we're going to make it a good
road car.
Yeah.
And they've got seven, a license to build seven forward models over the next 10 years.
Is that because there are seven vacant slots in the, you know, the serial numbers or something?
I don't know, because I think they get new serial numbers, and they're
all new cars, effectively.
So I don't, I don't know, so there'll be, yeah, there'll be Escort RS 200 and then another
five to follow, some of which will be quite nerdy, quite niche, apparently.
You've got to be a proper car person to know what they're going to be, along with them.
They own the Alan Mann Racing rights as well, so I think they'll be related to that a lot
of them.
Yeah, it'll be exciting.
Which is cool.
Next award up, I don't know whether we'll get through them all, but there's sort of nine
people awards we give out to.
The Monday award for engineering, we usually give to a person.
This year, we've given it to the BMW Neuerklasse architecture.
Yeah, the engineering team.
The engineering team behind that, which is led by a guy called Mike Weichelt, who says,
I don't get to do this.
Engineers don't get to do clean sheet of paper things from scratch, you know, but the
boss, Oliver Sipser, so phoned him up in 2000 and said, we want you to lead an entirely
new electric architecture team, please.
Thanks very much.
Is this the story you wrote?
Yeah, I did.
Yeah, I went to, because I did the first drive of the car that was out, the IX3, which is
the first car off that platform.
And they have the sort of backstory on the car at that point.
And it's clever stuff.
Yeah, such a successful, efficient thing.
The thing I admire about that car is the way they made it look Neuerklasse.
You know, it was a bit like what we were talking about with previously that there's a suggestion
of great days of BMW in the first cars, but clearly it's a complete rethink.
I gather, I don't know the cars, but it's pretty good, aren't they?
Yeah, yeah, I think the, yeah, the road testers gave the IX3 four and a half stars, I think.
And the I3 follows, which will be lower and more efficient and sleeker, so should have
a better range and better dynamics.
They can soften off the suspension because it's a lower car, so they don't have to have
such thick anti-roll bars and so on and so forth.
So it should be quite exciting.
Yeah, I like the original saloon proposal because I just happen to like saloons because
they're lower and smaller frontal area and all that.
But yeah, I got a pretty successful SUV too, isn't it?
Yeah.
Chris Whitehead writes to us to say, I run a 2021 Isle of Man Green BMW M3 saloon.
It is a lovely car.
I sometimes I'd wonder what to replace it with if I were to choose an electric powertrain.
Is there a car which would make me feel as good as the M3?
It would need to be, A, not an SUV, B, good looking, C, great to drive, D, not lose quite
a lot of depreciation.
Oh, well.
Chris puts it a rather less delicate way, he pre-owned and cost less than 50,000 pounds.
I haven't briefed you about this in advance.
The thing that goes immediately comes into my head would be some sort of Polestar because
I'm persuaded by the way they look.
I love that Scanduigian interior exterior.
I've great admirer of Max Mussoni, who was the design director there for a lot of the
time, or recent times.
Went to Alpina, but the last several models up to the five cars that he did, I think they're
beautiful cars and I believe they drive pretty well.
But I think you're asking a lot to get the buzz that would come from an M3, I think that's
asking a lot.
We'll presume the M3 is a manual for a start.
2021, does they do a manual 2021?
I really do.
I don't know, but anyway, I love a gearbox, mate.
I wonder about an Audi RS e-tron GT, whose depreciation may have already, it may have
already, as we give the Chris's phrase, lost its shit in depreciation.
It may have already had some of that stint, and likewise a Porsche Taycan maybe.
Yes, I think that's a good solution too.
I think that would be the three, and I suppose you'd have to try them.
But I must say, still our vechos of the first time I ever tried a Taycan, I remember thinking,
you know, half a mile down the road, this is a Porsche, steers like a Porsche, rides
like a Porsche.
I've got a lot of time for that car, even the earliest versions, I know they're a bit
limited on range and so on, but no problem with poke, build quality,
pretty affordable, bound to be under 50.
So that would be a good option, wouldn't it, a Taycan?
I reckon that might, we reckon Chris, that might be the answer.
One of our outstanding leaders is Klaus Zelma, Zelma, sorry, of Škoda.
Yes, well, we've both interviewed him, haven't we, because I think me years ago and you recently.
Yes, I think last year, because it was 130th, really nice guy, I liked him a lot.
He's been doing the job for a while, hasn't he?
I must say, I like leaders that have been in the job long enough to carry the protective
coating as it were, they kind of live the job, and I think he's one of them, he argues
well for the reasons Škoda isn't another company, if you get me.
So that's leadership, really, especially in an environment where you've got four or
other marks to battle against, you know, in-house ones.
Even in-house, yeah, I've got my questions in front of me, so I've got to speak to talk
to him on stage later.
I think the Škoda is the West's most profitable volume car maker, just amazingly good going,
given that they are a value brand.
Yeah, yeah, very good.
I suppose, yeah, they, well, people are, I suppose because they're paying a sensible price,
they're not so inclined to chisel, you know, especially what everything's bought on the
drip these days anyway, so the difference between a spectacular deal and an ordinary
one is probably, you know, 15 quid a month or something.
Did you hear the man from Ford earlier say that Ford is competing in 35 different racing
series?
No, yeah.
Is that today?
Our motorsport hero is Mark Rushbrook, who is the head of Ford Motorsport, I think he's
got a better title than that, but anyway, he's the head of Ford Motorsport, and when
he was first appointed Ford's motorsport engineering chief, there were seven engineers
he was in charge of, and now, I think, 10 years later, Ford is, I mean, they don't engineer
all the cars themselves, but they are supporting 35 different racing series.
Wow.
Gosh, you'd be going, so I'm just a name on your team, but I suppose they're in drag
racing, aren't they?
There's all sort of Mustangs race all around the world, don't they?
Yeah, they're in NASCAR, they're in Australian Supercars, they're in Formula One, of course,
they're in, I mean, how we, I don't know how you keep up with it.
Oh, I'm wondering what the relationship, do they still have a connection with Malcolm
Wilson or does he do the fiestas all of his own?
I kind of thought it was independent now, but with their endorsement rather than their
involvement, I quite know how that works.
Yeah, seems, still works out, doesn't it?
Yeah, but anybody who can look after all of that sort of stuff is our motorsport here.
Indeed.
You can keep on top of that.
Neil Yates, and you know Neil, I haven't met Neil.
Yeah, he'll be here tonight, so what's his award?
Well, he's a Cornish petrolhead who, you know, grew up dreaming of rallies and building rally
cars, you know, had a few goes at rallying himself, realized that he was even better
at building them and driving them, or he still does drive things.
So he has a business called Rally Prec, which is based, you know, about 50 yards from New
Key Airport in Cornwall, but since then he's decided that what is really needed in the
world is a means by which low-volume manufacturers, everybody from the builder of one concept
to cater them to the builder of, you know, a bunch of delivery vans, you know, up to
about 5,000 a month, 5,000 a year, sorry, beg your pardon, 5,000 a month would be a lot.
And he's proposed this modular self-jigging platform, so you don't need lots of presses
and particularly jigs and huge factories and stuff, you just get hold of all these extrusions
and these joining pieces that have been very cunningly designed, patented.
And as long as you design the stuff in the first place, you can just put it together
with the most rudimentary framing, so saving huge costs.
And he's already successful, you know, he's got customers that use this stuff in Europe
and using it for commercials and all kinds of stuff, but his heart is in the sports cars.
You know, there are also sports cars that use this stuff, but they like everything along
these lines, it's not necessarily credible, but it's aluminium clipped together stuff,
really clever.
Paces, is that right?
Paces, yeah.
And when they first showed it off, didn't they show it off with something that looked
like a Porsche 356 under the top, but it's got this electric skateboardy architecture.
That's it.
And the skateboard recently, actually beginning of the year, took a skateboard to Las Vegas,
what's it called, CES, the Consumer Electronics Show, where new cars tend to bob up.
And it was, it had used wheel motors, so hub motors knew to cars, and it was sporting
a new form of solar state battery.
So it's a sort of vehicle, an envelope for all kinds of high technology, although he's
a traditional rally man, and you'll find him going sideways on the weekend in his, you
know, his Austin Healy Sprite.
Or in your 205, GTI.
He, his heart is in the modern era.
It's not exactly motorsport central, is it, Newquay, Cornwall?
No, but he...
It's a long way, does that, that doesn't, clearly doesn't bother him?
Well, it's interesting.
I've been, as you probably know, I've been beating a path, because he is working on my
25.
I've been back and forth a fair bit, and the more I go there, the more clear it is that
there is actually all kinds of oddball motorsport, you know, there are lots of stuff done on
disused airfields around the place, and there was, my car was supposed to run, didn't get
it ready in time, but it was supposed to run in this event, which was, which was a kind
of field sprint.
And so it was, it was just somebody stubble field, with a track, and you know, a load
of cones, and you just, as Neil put it, you spend all days going, all day going sideways
through it.
And I didn't get there, but I gather it was a great event.
And also they run the Watergate Bay Hill Climb, or Sprint, where they get you, where the local
club at Newquay is allowed to shut a couple of public roads, and run a sprint there.
In fact, I've had two go's at it, once in a BMW I4, once in a Renault 5, good.
So they're keen, it's just that their closest formal local track is Castle Coom, which is
hundreds and miles away.
Somebody needs to open a racetrack in Cornwall.
Yeah.
On an airfield or something.
Yeah.
Have you met?
Because I haven't.
Olivier Francois.
No.
But no, I have not.
I've been in a group and heard him speak, and he, I mean, he seems to be leading all
kinds of good, good work at Fiat, particularly, doesn't he?
And I've just had three Fiat Pandas in a row, so I'm, so I'm, yeah, so he's the CEO.
But he is also Chief Marketing Officer for, is it all of the Stalantis brands?
Yes, I think so.
The large portion of the Stalantis brands, and there are a lot of them.
Chrysler, Dodge, Citroën, Opel, Alfa Romeo, or what they call their five regional brands,
and then DS and Lancia, which have been developed as specialty brands, apparently.
And then there's Maserati as well.
So there's a lot to look after, and the CEO of Fiat at the same time.
But he was once described as Dodge's Don Draper, the madman executive.
Fantastic.
Apparently.
So I don't know if that's fair or not, but I think I need to ask him about this.
In our intro, it says he has steered companies away from the brink of disaster several times.
Yeah.
But is that a fair way of putting it?
I believe so, yeah.
I mean, not least Fiat, because Fiat have faced all kinds of difficulties.
Remember they, in the days of Marchione, when he was in charge of the, or still building
the Stalantis, well, what became Stalantis after Tavares got involved as well.
I mean, they just were on the brink all the time.
And they had labour issues, and costs ran out of control in Italy and all kinds of problems.
And the automatic Fiat market fell away, and so he's, just to be here, I think he's doing well.
An outstanding UK leader in Orochi, who is heading BYD in the UK, which was, I think is
a new company, you might think is a new company, but has been selling buses here since
2011.
Yeah, and he, I met him for the story we run in the magazine, and he turns out he joined
the company BYD, straight from university in 2008, ambitious young bloke BYD wanted to
expand, so they got hold of task forces of young, ambitious people and sent them off
to markets, and he came to Europe, and he was involved in setting up markets for BYD
batteries, which is what they did big time at that stage.
He then was involved in selling buses to transport for London.
I think they've got 2800 of them just in London, which is a lot of buses.
If you put them in a line, they're probably reaching the moon.
Yeah, I mean, it is a measure of, what do they call it?
It's a, you know, like a swimming pool or Wales, it's an accepted unit of measurement,
isn't it?
The London bus is an accepted unit of measurement.
Yeah, that's it.
And they also had a go at launching an electric taxi through a business called Green
Tomato, I think it was called.
But the car wasn't very good.
I had a go in one years ago and I couldn't really see it.
Well, it didn't fill me with desire, put it that way.
And he, sorry, would they hour go to a taxi supplier at work?
Not sure.
Maybe.
When we were supposed to book a taxi through the office.
I thought Green Tomato was who they booked.
Well, I think Green Tomato had other stuff, though.
Oh, I see.
I think Bono, excellent name for a bloke born in China, isn't it?
Bono.
But anyway, he admits that it was a failure, right?
But he taught them stuff, you know, and he'll say now that they learned that European
desires have a lower tolerance for electronic gadgets than Chinese.
They, the Chinese require much more real room in a car, but they also don't care
about the boot size and we're the other way around.
We tend to squeeze people into the back seat as long as we've got a great big boot.
Yeah.
So he's been there for all the learning that has produced the BYDs of today.
So he, he's by no means a recent arrival.
No, and they've sold more EVs, registered more EVs this year than any other company.
Yeah, they pretty good.
There was a the big claim was that they had outsold Tesla.
And then I think it was last September, but Tesla came back.
But I think VYD have now reinstated themselves.
So they are right at the top of the tree.
They face some difficulties in China, I believe, because there's real dogfight over
there for sales.
Local buyers are pretty hard to impress, like everywhere, I suppose.
Yeah.
But yes, Jeanine works for horse.
Have you written that?
Did you write that story?
No, no, but I met him.
Oh, did you?
Yeah, Frankfurt, I think it was really interesting bloke, meaning he's great.
You know, when you just, when, when, when you first hear about this notion of somebody
building petrol engines because everybody else has stopped, it all sounds a bit moribund
and sort of old tech, but in fact, the way they're, they're doing it and offering it
to people, to other manufacturers as, as a way of streamlining their own manufacturing
businesses and the sophistication of the simple sophistication of these engines that
they're building is really impressive.
And it's actually, as he explains it, it's a, it's a trip towards, you know, low carbon.
It is a, it is a really, they're making a big contribution towards the low carbon
traffic, you know, transport situation.
So great, perfect man for the job.
He's such a good explainer.
I'm sort of exhilarating having him explain it to you as you might find out tonight.
Yeah, I'm looking forward to it.
And it's a joint venture between Renault and Geely, which has a 90% stake in horse power
train, which is then supplying, well, the quote is, everybody is interested, as he says,
what they're doing, you know, for, for, so yes, it's one of those companies, it's one
of those enormous companies you may never hear of, these products.
They're based in London, aren't they?
Yeah, I think so.
It's a funny place to be based, it seems to me, because all the big scale car
manufacturing's somewhere else.
Yeah.
Let's take a very short break to tell you that this pod is sponsored by Anderson,
Anderson-PV.com, they're makers of home PV chargers, premium stuff, design led, and
actually out on the lawn earlier, our employer does have a little stand out there.
They were doing a thing with other brands in the high market stable, if I noticed.
Yeah, yeah, but they've got a concierge service.
They'll look after you all the way through.
Prices start at 695 pounds.
John Manjian writes to us to say, auto car at a market.com, by the way, on the TV show
Hostage on Netflix, the prime minister in the show, played by Siran Jones, was being
whisked away from imminent danger in a 2025 BMW 7 series.
We may have covered similar topics to this before, the BMW looks sophisticated and luxurious,
but not a Jaguar XJ, which I think has been the real life go-to limo for Royal and
diplomatic VIPs for ages, if not in some movies and TV shows.
What were the recent production stuff, is it Jaguar?
What would make for the best UK diplomatic and Royal limo in TV shows and, I guess,
in real life? This is clearly a matter of national urgency.
I think they are using 7 series, aren't they?
I think I've seen actual BMWs.
I can comment a bit on this, because my house in the sticks is amazingly close to the church
where Princess Anne's son Peter Phillips got married a few days ago, or a couple of weeks
ago, by the time people hear this, and so I was there looking out of my top window,
clocking the cars that everybody came in, and there were lots of Audi A8s,
loads of Bentley Bentaygas, the King arrived in a BMW i7, quite similar to the one that I
borrowed from the press office a couple of weeks earlier, but not the same car I checked,
and also they turned up in I think... Thicker windows, do you think?
And there was a, I think the bride showed up in a late 20s Rolls-Royce, I think it might have been
a Phantom 3 or 2, but the thing that struck me watching this lot was that they don't really
care about cars from the point of view of where they come from.
I'll bet you that in Italy, anybody official goes around an Italian car, and then everybody,
imagine a French getting driven around in a BMW, I can't, but it seems to happen here,
they've got a mixture of Audi's, BMWs, I didn't see a Jag, because they're a bit behind the
tire, I suppose the technology's not there anymore. Bentayga...
Long time ago, or maybe even before that. Which would make them quite leggy, I suppose they like
a newer, more reliable and inverted commas, they want a new car for that reason, I suppose.
I'm not sure that they're in charge of events either, people like Jaguar and Bentley and so on,
I've got a royalty ambassador person who's always pressing the royalty to borrow a
Bentayga for the weekend or so on. But I'm surprised that there isn't a policy,
they just seem to get hold of some graceful looking, rather large black thing and drive it
around, whatever it is, and I think they need to do better. It does feel like the sort of thing
where they ought to drive something made here if possible. Yeah, I would have thought of Bentley
Rolls Royce, why not? They're pretty respectable for that kind of use. Yeah, I think we've talked
about before, is there the possibility that politicians would not want to be seen in Bentley's
because it's a bit flash, but I don't know. The new Jag is not going to be the car though,
is it? Because it's so tiny inside, well not tiny, but not limo, is it? No, it needs a big
back door so people can slide gracefully in and out, don't they? Yeah, I think a Bentley Flying
Spur would be the thing. They could let it be known that they've come at the right price,
maybe run a few second hand ones, why not? Back to the awards in partnership with Siemens,
and the big award which is the Isegolis trophy, which is going to Stefan Winkleman of Lamborghini.
Yeah, he's done a wonderful job, you could argue, isn't he? Because he's been there a long time,
he was, I think he was briefly replaced by someone else, but there was a, the people right at the
top of the group, the VW group, gave him another job, I think at Audi briefly. Yeah, and he did
some Bugatti stuff from like, 2018 to 2022, but I think something like 15 of the past 20 years,
or something like, he has been the man at Lamborghini. Well, he's perfect, isn't he,
because he's got, I think he's got both German and Italian background, family background,
so he's satisfactorily Italian for the purposes of the local, the labor party,
the labor force and so on, but he understands the German way of doing things, and he's seen
the Urus into production and so on, that's been an extremely successful car,
and they're doing well, aren't they? And he coped with the electrification issues,
I think that there's no electric car, but there's, there are some hybrids, aren't there?
Yeah, I think he says that, you know, plug-in hybrids are the way to go for them, because if
they went electric, I think he described it as an expensive hobby,
if they went full electric at the moment, because I don't suppose people are knocking on the door
and saying, I really want a Lamborghini, but it must be electric, I don't think that's what people
are doing. Yeah, and at that level, you could imagine people being happy enough to buy
sort of low carbon fuel anyway, or zero carbon fuel, whatever I mean. And they're not doing big
miles, I mean the Urus will do, will be a daily driver for a lot of people, but the sports cars
will be doing very small mileagees anyway, so it's not like, you know, I don't see the case.
So 10,000 cars last year, I'm interested to see how many cars is right for a luxury car company,
how many is too many? Seems to hang around 10,000, doesn't it? Because Ferrari have
been sort of, in my memory have been, you know, I can remember Montez Emile saying we'll never
make more than 6,000, and you know, they burst through, they do 12, 13, or something like that.
Aston Martin would like to do 10,000, Lamborghini have done 10,000, I mean Bugatti too far up the
pole for that kind of numbers, but I think it's 10,000 plus or minus, and the story seems to be,
I used to think that 10,000 was flooding the market, but the point they all make is that they've,
in recent years, they've been so much expansion of export markets, you know, they,
somebody like Ferrari probably sell in, you know, 50 different markets, and they,
if you spread those cars around you, yeah, we've spread them quite thin, there are more
rich people than there ever were, so therefore, yeah, we're always getting that, that annoying
statistic, that HNW, high net worth, people are expanding like, you know, breeding like rabbits,
as it were, yeah, yeah, not you and me, though, sport, no, I am not a high net worth, I don't
know about a low net worth, I don't know what the correct description would be for normal,
you know, middle of the road net worth, yeah, the, I'm going to write this in my column next week,
I think the reaction to the Ferrari Luce electric car seems to be way beyond what is normal
for somebody who just doesn't like the look of the car, yeah, it seems to have triggered an
extraordinary outrage. I wonder if it's in this country or... It's just a car, it's
that's all it is, it seems to be a history, but anyway, I was wondering why, and I wondered if
it was just because it's, we've become accustomed to, well, I've used the word before, in shitification,
which is, and you know, shrinkflation and the world changing and people's
slightly discomfort was, I wonder when it all started, somebody said the other day when I was
chatting to them on a thing, they said, did you hear the story about the guy from one of the American
airliners, I can't remember which airline it was, he decided that he would remove
one olive from every salad they served, in about the early 80s or late 70s,
and the customer wouldn't really notice one olive going out the salad, but in the end it saved the
airline, I don't know what it saved them, $50,000 a year, which would translate to several hundred
thousand dollars, so they did it, but there comes a point where people go, hang on a minute,
this, I'm, this, this friend is more expensive than it used to be, or this, this X is not, this
box of qualities for it's smaller than it used to be, or this, whatever, there comes a point where,
and things just creep and creep and creep, and it's the sort of salami effect, a little slice
goes, but do you notice, another little slice goes, but do you notice, and at what point do you go,
hang on a minute, and I want to know if in the world of move towards electrification, which
hasn't thrilled everybody, people were still thinking, if at least I can have a poster of
a Ferrari on my bedroom, and then maybe it's just the fact that this has arrived now, not looking
perhaps as beautiful as it could do, but it's not, the outrage is not, because this is a new
electric Ferrari, you don't like to look off very much, it's just an accumulation of everything,
and people have just gone, I can't, I just can't take it anymore, I've just had enough.
I think that's quite likely, but I think also another thread may be the fact that
Ferrari have been so good for so long, that it's, people have almost sort of enjoyed the
fact that they're happy that they've done something which can be represented as a
even though it's not that bad. I think it's not that bad, I just know that if somebody
brought one of those to my house and said, do you fancy going to the new Ferrari, I'd be bloody
impressed, I would, and I've got a feeling that, and the other thing of course is that this car,
which is deemed to be imperfect, it makes a recovery possible, doesn't it? There'll be a
something will happen downstream, and the car will look better, and everybody will say,
Johnny Ives got his mojo back or something. I think it's just, I think you could almost
argue that it's a great, it's a fantastic thing, it's far more interesting than if
it had just been another static car. If it was an electric Puro Sangue, for example,
yeah, it's more interesting than that. And it's a bit like, I argue that Aston Martin in F1 is
interesting because it is so far around the U-Bend, and yet I predict that they're going to recover,
it's going to get better, they're going to have to do something about, they'll have to get rid of
Lance Stroll, I think, and get a better driver, but Alonso, I don't know if it even goes.
Yeah, I'm all for the old guys. What's I going to ask you about?
Yeah, I think what doesn't help that Ferrari is the fact that some of those launch colours
are traditional Ferrari colours, but don't necessarily suit that shape, and also because
they've sort of insisted on that five-spoke wheel that just looks a bit weird, but there is a turbine
wheel that they do, which is much lower drag, which I suspect is the love from Johnny Ives design,
rather than the Ferrari design, because the five-spoke just looks like it doesn't quite
belong on that car, whereas the turbine, not everybody loves it, but it does actually look like
it fits that car. I hadn't actually thought of that. I reckon that it is a funny wheel, you're
right. You do wonder what the, there must have been quite a lot of political discussion before,
you know, it wouldn't have just been these two blokes locked in a room doing whatever they like,
so there must have been a lot of negotiation went on. I think the more I look at it, the more
I think it's all right. You know, somebody wants to give me one, I'll have it, no trouble.
What would you take away from the London concourse?
Interesting, isn't it? I was walking around, I'm not a natural hypercar man to be truthful,
because to me they're starting to look the same. They're all looking this, and there are quite a
lot of very extremely low volume marks that, and their backers think they're special, but
they just look the same to me. There's a fantastic Citroen CX Prestige, CX25 Prestige down there that
I would like to convey me home, please. There's a beautiful Alpha GTA down there with a lovely
Perspex Windows race car. What else did I see? Oh, there's a whole clutch of yellow
Lamborghinis and Ferraris, and the thing that I liked best was out of that lot was a Countache
by a mile. I think it's an absolutely magnificent, just becomes more magnificent that car, as long
as it's an early model without the body kit that somebody erroneously fitted. LP 400, that's the one.
What a car. Oh, the Yank, that's right. There's a pretty big collection of American cars. There's a
magnificent Cadillac, but it wasn't in very good order. So I'd go for the Dodge Charger.
Dodge Charger 500, whatever that is. I don't know if that means 500 guvik inches. I thought that looks
pretty good. Yeah, I'm with you on that. Yeah, I'm with you on that. Let's finish up by talking about
this is from your column last week, so you might not remember this. There's a Renault 5 turbo made
in Lego, and it has passed its... Got to 10,000. What did we talk about this last week? A bit,
but I don't know whether we said that this guy David Collins had achieved it, but
the salient points were that you get 32 months. If you're bidding to have your car taken seriously
by the Lego creators, you get 32 months to garner these 10,000 votes. He did it in 44 days. Oh,
well. With help from Renault UK and I think Renault in France as well. But that just makes it a good
thing. And I can... Well, I have already made certain representations to anybody that might be
going to buy me in my family that might be going to buy me a Christmas present. Should it be out
inside for Christmas? Then they don't want to get you. Good. I reckon we're... I think guests are
going to start arriving at any moment in our thing. So we'll wrap this one. Thanks for joining us.
That was some info on the AutoCars Awards in association with Siemens.
And this pod is sponsored by Anderson. If you visit Anderson-EV.com, you'll find out more about
their charges. Steve and I will be back this time next week. In the meantime, there is a chat that
you've had. With Peter Armstrong? Oh, no, actually, that's just gone, actually, hasn't it? That's
already... Yeah, that was four days ago. Sorry. Right. That's on the pod. So yes, there's bonus wise.
I don't know. Yeah, I forgot to do. It might just be letters on the next page. Oh, yeah, we did a
letters one, didn't we? That's right. No, that's already gone as well. So I don't know. What is time
for a flight like this? I know, I know. But anyway, there'll be a pod on Saturday and then Steve and
I will be back on Wednesday. Thanks for joining us. Subscribe if you haven't. Please. Love it if you
give this a like or a sub or a rating or whatever you can do. Thanks, mate. See you later. See you next time.
About this episode
From the AutoCar Awards dinner—held at the Honourable Artillery Company and in partnership with Siemens—to design careers and concept-car “familiarity,” the hosts connect people, ideas, and engineering. Julian Thompson’s influence runs from the first Lotus Elise to Jaguar’s XF, while a Corvette EV concept stays recognisably Corvette. Elsewhere, they marvel at a 10,000 RPM car, debate rally heritage versus road intent with the RS 200, and discuss BMW’s Neuerklasse clean-sheet EV architecture.
In this week's My Week In Cars Steve Cropley and Matt Prior talk more about the Autocar Awards, where they recorded this podcast. The people are the stars this week: CEOs of FIAT, Lamborghini, WATT, and others. Plus there's about the London Concours, the venue at which our awards were held.
The pair also talk your letters and much more besides. For details of a special offer which gives you SIX issues of Autocar for just £6 if you click here.
