SEAT Cupra CEO confirms Formentor EV and a new electric SUV are coming to the US
SEAT S.A. shared its full 2023 financial results earlier today while also outlining its plans for the future. Part of its strategy includes bringing its Cupra EVs over to the US market, beginning with the all-electric version of the Formentor crossover as well as a larger SUV.
SEAT Cupra, S.A.U., better known as Cupra, is a high-performance brand founded in 2018 as a subsidiary of Spanish automaker SEAT, which itself has operated as a wholly-owned sub-brand of Volkswagen Group since the mid-’80s.
In line with much of the brands under the VW Group umbrella, Cupra has made public vows to go all-electric, promising three new EV models by 2025. That initial rollout includes an angry-looking electric hatchback called the Raval, derived from the UrbanRebel concept.
The Raval will join the all-electric Tavascan, which launches later this year, and the Born, Cupra’s first-ever BEV, in a lineup that has already adopted several plug-in hybrids that will pave the way for all-electric versions of existing models such as the Leon and Formentor (seen below).
Nearly one year ago to the day, we reported that the Spanish automaker was mulling entry into the US market in its quest to expand to a global EV brand. SEAT Cupra CEO Wayne Griffiths spoke at the time:
As far as our ambition of being truly global, we are currently analyzing a possible entry into the North American market. At the moment, we are testing our brand with potential clients; we think Americans would love Cupra’s design and great performance.
During a presentation earlier today, Griffiths took Cupra’s ambitions a step further, confirming plans to sell EVs in the US by the end of this decade.
Cupra plans to enter US market before end of the decade
After reporting an all-time high operating profit for 2023 and record Cupra deliveries, SEAT executives outlined the Spanish automaker’s vision for the future to maintain such profitable growth. Much of that will rely on its performance brand and its transition into BEVs.
The release describes 2024 as the beginning of Cupra’s most extensive product offensive, promising the launch of “new heroes for a new era.” In addition to new BEV and electrified models, globalization remains a crucial target in the brand’s future strategy. Furthermore, those expansions do, in fact, include the sale of Cupra EVs in the US. Per SEAT S.A. CEO Wayne Griffiths:
By the end of the decade CUPRA will be entering the US market. We plan to launch with the battery electric version of the Formentor and a bigger electric crossover SUV. That crossover SUV will be produced at Volkswagen Group factories in the North America region, including Mexico. Initially, CUPRA will launch in selected states in the East and West coasts and the Sun Belt states. This will be done through a new distribution model.
If and when Volkswagen Group facilities assist in producing Cupra EVs for the US market and other parts of North America, it will join SEAT’s existing production commitments in Spain as part of a $3.2 billion investment announced in February 2023. That facility will be home to production of the aforementioned Cupra Raval and the Volkswagen ID.2All.
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EV sales kept up their momentum in December 2024, with incentives playing a big role, according to the latest Cox Automotive’s Kelley Blue Book report.
December’s strong EV sales saw an average transaction price (ATP) of $55,544, which helped push the industry-wide ATP higher, according to Kelley Blue Book. The December ATP for an EV was higher year-over-year by 0.8%, slightly below the industry average, and higher month-over-month by 1.1%. Tesla ATPs were higher year-over-year by 10.5%.
Incentives for EVs remained elevated in December, although they were slightly lower month-over-month at 14.3% of ATP, down from 14.7% in November.
EV incentives were higher by an impressive 41% year-over-year and have been above 12% of ATP for six consecutive months. Strong sales incentives, which averaged more than $6,700 per sale in 2024, were one reason EV sales surpassed 1.3 million units last year, according to Cox Automotive, a new record for volume and share.
(My colleague Jameson Dow reported yesterday, “In 2024, the world sold 3.5 million more EVs than it did in the previous year … This increase is larger than the 3.2 million increase in EV sales from the previous year – meaning that EV sales aren’t just up, but that the rate of growth is itself increasing.”)
Kelley Blue Book estimated that in December, approximately 84,000 vehicles – or 5.6% of total sales – transacted at prices higher than $80,000 – the highest volume ever. KBB lumps gas cars and EVs together into this luxury vehicle category, so this is where Tesla Cybertruck is slotted.
However, Tesla bundles sales figures of Cybertruck with Model S, Model X, and Tesla Semi(!) into a category it calls “other models,” so we don’t know for sure exactly how many Cybertrucks Tesla sold in Q4, much less in December. However, Electrek‘s Fred Lambert estimates between 9,000 and 12,000 Cybertrucks were sold in Q4, and that’s not a stellar sales figure.
What will January bring when it comes to EV ATPs? What about tax credits? Check back in a month and I’ll fill you in.
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Tesla is now claiming that Cybertruck was the ‘best-selling electric pickup in US’ last year despite not even reporting the number of deliveries.
There’s a lot of context needed here.
As we often highlighted, Tesla is sadly one of, if not the most, opaque automakers regarding sales reports.
Tesla doesn’t break down sales per model or even region.
For comparison, here’s Ford’s Q4 2024 sales report compared to Tesla’s:
You could argue that Tesla has fewer models than Ford, and that’s true, but Tesla’s report literally has two lines despite having six different models.
There’s no reason not to offer a complete breakdown like all other automakers other than trying to make it hard to verify the health of each vehicle program.
This has been the case with the Cybertruck. Tesla is bundling its Cybertruck deliveries with Model S, Model X, and Tesla Semi deliveries.
Despite this lack of disclosure, Tesla has been able to claim that the Cybertruck has become “the best-selling electric pickup truck” in the US in 2024:
It very well might be true. Ford disclosed 33,510 F-150 Lightning truck deliveries in the US in 2024 while most estimates are putting Cybertruck deliveries at around 40,000 units.
Those are global deliveries, but Tesla only delivered the Cybertruck in the US, Canada, and Mexico in 2024, and most of the deliveries are believed to be in the US.
However, there’s essential context needed here, as we highlighted in our recent ‘Tesla Cybertruck sales are disastrous‘ article.
First off, Tesla had a backlog of over 1 million reservations for the Cybertruck that it has been building since 2019. This led many to believe Tesla already had years of demand baked in for the truck and that production would be the constraint.
However, based on estimates, again, because Tesla refuses to disclose the data, Cybertruck deliveries were either flat or down in Q4 versus Q3 despite Tesla introducing cheaper versions of the vehicle and ramping up production.
Again, that’s after just about 40,000 deliveries.
Furthermore, with almost 11,000 deliveries in Q4 in the US, Ford more likely than not outsold Cybertruck with the F-150 Lightning in Q4.
Electrek’s Take
Tesla is in damage control here. There’s no doubt that it is having issues selling the Cybertruck.
Inventory is full of Cybertrucks and Tesla is now discounting them and offering free lifetime Supercharging.
Tesla is great at ramping up production, and it’s clear the Cybertruck is not production-constrained anymore. It is demand-constrained despite having over 1 million reservations.
Again, those reservations were made before Tesla unveiled the production version, which happened to have less range and cost significantly more.
The upcoming cheaper single motor version should help with demand, but I have serious doubts Tesla can ramp this program up to more than 100,000 units in the US.
As a reminder, Tesla installed a production capacity of 250,000 units annually and Musk said he could see Tesla selling 500,000 Cybertrucks per year.
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