Removing a design-led CEO and installing two numbers-focused executives was an obvious move, says Palmer, now chairman of Pod Point, a UK supplier of electric car charging stations.
Putting a designer at the helm of Polestar was a “brave experiment”, says Palmer, but adds: “I don’t know if appointing accountants [in Ingenlath’s place] automatically is the right answer, but having executives with automotive experience who understand vehicle financing and manufacturing is kind of a must.”
Regardless of the new hires, Polestar could be busy on its own, says Palmer. “I think we’re going to see a lot of car companies fail, especially those in the premium space.”
Professor Wells agrees, but says “bean counters are not the only solution” for Polestar. “The main problem is that consumers don’t know what the brand should stand for and how it differs from Volvo. [The new executive team] they have to decide whether to keep it as a separate brand or reduce it to a sub-brand. In practice, [sub-brand option] may be the best answer for them.
Wells says Polestar, who they contacted for this piece, didn’t distance themselves enough from Volvo. “There is not enough space between the design language of the two brands,” he said. Indeed, Volvo’s new EV flagship, the EX90, is basically a family version of the Polestar 3, as it shares much of the same underpinnings.
Courtesy of Volvo
To really differentiate itself from Volvo, Polestar needed to provide more “visual differentiation”, says Wells, as well as offer “performance differences but also other features in the car”. He adds that the Polestar “should have had better surprises and delights” rather than “position”. [its] cars as a slightly higher price than a Volvo equivalent.’
And Polestar is one of many EV brands exposed to a falling tide, he believes. “There’s room for error in a growing market,” Wells says. “But in a static or depressed market, the pressure [to be profitable] is intense.” The new executives must “step down [Polestar] back into Volvo to a greater extent and accept that it will be a niche brand for quite some time to come.”
Polestar’s brand problems started early, Wells says. “It was strange [Polestar was] started from [Volvo] acquiring that high-performance gasoline business and then rebranding it as a premium electric brand.” That was a ‘mistake’, Wells judged. “[Polestar] it was also too slow to get a product to market and too slow to make money when the sun was shining.
