Hello and welcome to your daily Charge Smart blog! Today, we will be taking a look at a new EV manufacturer out of Turkey called Togg.
Above: The new Pininfarina styled Togg SUV
Yep, Turkey have just become the latest country to have their own car manufacturer and more specifically, it’s a company that solely makes EVs. The company’s called Togg and no, they don’t have anything to do with a good day at the beach. The odd name stands for Turkish Automobile group but the brand is derived from its Turkish name which abbreviates nicely to Togg.
The company aims to produce around 175,000 vehicles a year at a cost of $3.7 billion to be spent over the next 13 years. Looks like they are in it for the long haul. You may ask yourself, what chance does an unknown Turkish EV brand have if a highly promising EV manufacturer like Nio is struggling in the market.
While we’re still waiting for some of the bigger names in the car industry to release their own EVs, remember that it was a little-known start-up called Tesla that first became a household name as far as EVs go. And thanks to them, we now have other independent EV manufacturers like Rimac and Nio. You can now add, Togg to that exclusive list. The Turkish president was present at the launch of the new brand and he stated his wishes for Togg to become a global brand and he congratulated them for realizing a 60-year dream of the nation’s. To have their very own Turkish made automobile.
Togg has plans to release 5 new cars initially, the first one will be called “Dressing” followed by the “gobble”, “shoot” and the “leg” as far as we know. It’s probably a good idea for them to have those names checked out beforehand though. I’m not sure I’d fancy having a car called the shoot.
Above: The Togg is stylish both inside and out
Anyway, the Turkish government is closely tied with Togg as we saw from the president’s presence at the launch of the brand. They will probably be the company’s largest customers initially as well with plans to purchase 30,000 of Togg’s cars for government use by 2035. The president is so committed in fact that he pledged to buy the very first car that they produced, plus he promised to pay for it with his own money and not that of taxpayers! Turkey are no stranger to car manufacturing actually. They produced cars for Ford, Fiat, Hyundai and Toyota which are then exported to the rest of the continent, so it was possibly just a matter of time before they created their own car company and manufactured the vehicles locally.
It’s a rather positive piece of news from a country that lies in a region full of turmoil, a region with a tremendous love for oil. Turkey’s mission to create their own EV brand is certainly admirable. While the Turkish government’s ethics in handling political situations around the country are certainly questionable and will probably affect the brand’s reputation worldwide. We can only say that another electric car company is certainly a good step forward for the automotive industry and for the globe. This is a good step forward from an unknown car brand.
This is probably the best time in the last 100 years for new startup car manufacturers -
The existing legacy car manufacturers have lost their advantage and are probably at a disadvantage because an EV they sell is INSTEAD of a petrol car
The market and potential demand is huge
BUT they need to get moving - there is a huge "hole" NOW
By 2025 that "hole" may well be closing