The ongoing discussions about profit margins on the “first” [mass scale] generation of EVs from the Big Three supposedly being razor thin or even leading to loses has left me wondering if anyone be it the US DOT or a NGO has attempted to estimate how much the total cost for retooling the US automotive industry towards BEVs might look like in the end.
Obviously, I understand a lot of factors -from funding streams at every level of government, to international relations, to even just timing- can play an immense role in the calculation of such an estimate but I’m curious if there’s even a ballpark estimate. Have any analysts attempted to come up with with a “realistic” estimate of, say, when GM will have fully absorbed the setup cost for Ultium and vehicle unit cost will just be determined by the opex overhead of a given production line rather than having to also account for the upfront capex of the whole platform and production chain buildup?
Right. Sorry I should have clarified I was also including battery manufacturing set up cost in the platform buildup/start up cost. Even assuming China-US relations weren’t what they currently are I would assume a significant amount of battery manufacturing capacity would need to be built Stateside just to support the volume of vehicles being produced and reduce the logistical headache of shipping cells and packs across the sea.