► New Lynk & Co concept car
► Stylish new plug-in hybrid shown
► Latest news from mobility disruptor
This dramatically styled concept car points to the next generation of plug-in hybrids from Lynk & Co. The Next Day premieres the Chinese firm’s E-Motive PHEV hardware, wrapped up in a glamorous quad-scissor-doored sports car silhouette.
You only need to look at the complexity of those doors to realise they probably won’t make production, but then again Lynk & Co is here to disrupt received wisdom.
Flick through our gallery above and you’ll see the interior is equally radical, with a yoke for steering-by-wire and a minimalist vibe throughout.
The Next Day was unveiled in China at the company’s summer conference. It calls it a four-door GT, positioning the concept close to an Audi e-Tron GT in character and nothing like the brand’s existing choice of more conventional crossovers. But rather than ogle the sizzling looks, this car is about what is under the skin.
Lynk & Co The Next Day: future hybrid car tech
Better to pay attention to the E-Motive plug-in hybrid technology. The company has zero information on its media channels about this vehicle, but CAR understands The Next Day offers three different battery pack sizes offering a choice of 37, 62 or 93 miles of pure electric running.
The E-Motive powertrain is familiar from its use in Volvo XC40 Recharge and existing Lynk & Co 01 crossover, paired to the group’s 1.5-litre three-cylinder petrol engine. It shares those cars’ common modular architecture (CMA) platform.
Details are scarce, but the more powerful The Next Day models are purportedly able to sprint from 0-62mph in around five seconds. The concept was designed in Lynk & Co’s Gothenburg styling studio, next to Geely stablemates Volvo and Polestar.
When is Lynk & Co coming to the UK?
Lynk & Co launched in 2016 as a pure subscription play. It’s all about membership numbers, rather than registrations, and CEO Allain Visser reckons the pandemic has accelerated the roll-out: membership in Europe now stands at 120,000 – and that’s before Lynk & Co has even arrived in the UK.
‘We started in seven left-hand drive countries in 2021, with the clear intention to go to the UK in Phase 2 of our roll-out, currently at the end of 2023 or early 2024.’ By the time the brand arrives in the UK, it is likely to have transitioned to all-electric, he told us.
The entire Lynk & Co business plan is predicated on the gamble that traditional car ownership is dead and the market will flip to more flexible subscription models. Visser is convinced that the pandemic and cost of living crisis is fuelling this transition.
‘There are enough people who are ready to do something very different: they’re sick and tired of going to a dealer, haggling for a discount, choosing between 15 different colours, the hundreds of options,’ he says. ‘They just want something very simple. They don’t want to buy a car, just use the car.’