Aston Martin's Lucid Dream To Be Fully Electric by 2030 Now One Step Closer to Reality

Aston Martin (AM) will launch its first all-electric model in 2025 and plans to go combustion-free by 2030, and teaming up with a BEV manufacturer is more cost- and time-effective than developing everything in-house.

Until the market witnesses the first fully electrified Aston, the company will introduce a plug-in hybrid, the Valhalla mid-engined supercar, in 2025 (if all goes according to plan). The second phase of switching to electron power is to provide an electric alternative for all models in Aston Martin’s lineup – a move that is supposed to be a reality from 2026 onward.

Rather than investing vast amounts of funds and time in developing an entirely new platform by itself, Aston Martin relies on Lucid’s current and future solutions for the BEV platform. However, the emblematic carmaker won’t simply transplant Lucid heart into Aston’s body. Instead, it aims to create a single all-electric platform on which all future models will be based, from hypercars to SUVs, sportscars, and supercars.

Subject to shareholder approval, the British luxury sportscar maker will issue 28.4 million new ordinary shares to Lucid Group and phase $232 million in cash payments. According to Lucid, the total value of this deal - a premiere for the American company - is north of $450 million. Overall, AM has allotted over £2 billion ($2.55 billion) in advanced technologies for the next five years in traditional internal combustion and battery-electric technologies.

Although the Lucid deal is crucial for Aston Martin’s accelerated electrification, the Brits won’t cut existing ties with its existing partner, Mercedes-Benz. The Germans will provide the low-volume British manufacturer with powertrain and electronic platforms for all three types of architectures (ICE, hybrid, and BEV).

Aston will fully benefit from Lucid’s and Mercedes’ expertise on battery efficiency (both in storage capacity and physical size of the cells), inverter technology, and twin-motor platforms (the key point in the limitless four-wheel torque vectoring tuning).

With great (electric) power comes great responsibility; this mantra has pushed Aston Martin to pay closer attention to other high-tech solutions for high-speed machines. Brembo is currently developing a brake-by-wire system that controls the braking force electronically. The computer-assisted stopping architecture is claimed to improve vehicle range and brakes responsiveness while reducing pad wear.

`Power is nothing without control` is a Pirelli dictum that Aston Martin has more than fully learned (through its Formula One team, for one). The Brits and the Italian tire manufacturer will introduce the Pirelli Cyber Tire technology with the latest generation of the P Zero R. An array of sensors gather real-world-usage data to assess each tire’s load separately, giving accurate range estimates.