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CEO Mary Barra Still Thinks GM Can Beat Tesla, Narrows Down Claim to the U.S. Only

CEO Mary Barra still thinks GM can beat Tesla 8 photos
Photo: GM
GM's Mary Barra vows to blow Tesla out of the waterGM present new battery for its upcoming EVsGM present new battery for its upcoming EVsGM present new battery for its upcoming EVsUltium Cell Battery PackUltium Cell ChassisMary Barra announces GM investment in Michigan
In an interview with Associated Press, GM CEO Mary Barra reiterated her pledge to surpass Tesla by mid-decade. The only difference now is that Barra narrows down her claim to the U.S. territory. GM CEO thinks her company will win customers with lower prices for models “in the heart of the market.”

For a major carmaker, General Motors significantly lags behind the competition when it comes to electric vehicles. Even though GM had a leg in electrification many years before everyone else, the past couple of years has seen the company disappearing from EV sales statistics. The Bolt EV fires and the following production stop tanked GM’s EV ambitions. However, the company works hard to bring the Ultium line of vehicles to the market.

Mary Barra believes her strategy to deliver affordable EVs to the market will pay off, and Tesla, with its higher prices, will bleed market share. That may be true, although we haven’t seen any benefits of the Chevy Bolt being so affordable at $26,000. GM reported combined sales of 7,300 EVs in the second quarter, which includes the GMC Hummer EV and the BrightDrop Zevo 600 commercial van. Even if Barra thinks GM is on track to surpass Tesla, it sure doesn’t look like that.

GM has a flurry of affordable EVs ready to enter production, like the Chevy Equinox EV and the Blazer EV next year. Cadillac will also fight Tesla at the higher end with the Lyriq, already in production. But no matter how many models GM will launch, they will not help with Mary Barra’s goal unless GM can build them at scale. Right now, it seems that either GM cannot do that (the GMC Hummer EV selling way above its MSRP is an example), or the customers are not interested (Bolt is a hard sell even though it’s dirt-cheap).

Perhaps realizing that overtaking Tesla globally is impossible, Marry Barra now talks about selling more EVs in the U.S. While this could be attainable, provided that everything goes against Tesla and everything turns out great for GM, we should put things in perspective. GM sold less than 10% of Tesla’s U.S. estimates last year, and the situation looks a lot bleaker for GM in 2022. The company even struggles behind its archrival Ford regarding electric vehicles.

Expanding this globally, GM doesn’t stand a chance against Tesla. Giga Shanghai is on track to build 1,000,000 vehicles this year and will soon have the capacity to double that. Add Berlin, Texas, and Fremont to the basket, and you see that 2025 will be a stellar year for Elon Musk’s company. By then, an economic war would be in place to secure the raw materials and battery cells needed to build EVs, and right now, Tesla looks ahead of everyone else in this regard.

Things point in a somewhat different direction than the one Mary Barra is counting on. For the foreseeable future, the EV war is poised to be fought by just three players, and neither GM nor Ford are among them. The players are Tesla, BYD, and Volkswagen. However, this might change considering how many problems the German company faces with EV software at the moment. To Mary Barra, we can only say the clock is ticking.

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About the author: Cristian Agatie
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After his childhood dream of becoming a "tractor operator" didn't pan out, Cristian turned to journalism, first in print and later moving to online media. His top interests are electric vehicles and new energy solutions.
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