Hyundai teases "Electrified Streamliner" - the new Ioniq 6

After a bumpy start for the Ioniq 6, when it was delayed by 3 months to make design changes after the chairman of Hyundai expressed his dislike of the car, the latest EV from South Korean giant is about to finally enter production. Hyundai’s marketing machine is waking up and we have the first official video teaser to enjoy.

As with all teasers there’s a lot of material but very little substance. Hyundai points out historical and architectural references of the Ioniq 6 design and then calls it an Electrified Streamliner. The story of Ioniq 6 starts with one of the most talked about prototypes in automotive history, Hyunday gave us one of the best looking 4-door cars ever with the Prophecy prototype.

Unfortunately the production car was so far away from the prototype that Hyundai’s chairman ordered redesign of front and rear bumpers which resulted in the car not only being delayed by 3 months but getting actually longer by 20mm. The finally approved car was then tested around the world and it was spotted numerous times wearing just partial camouflage to hide the bumper details.

Hyundai Ioniq 6 will be the first car in the world to introduce what the company calls an “intelligent lighting grille”. The LEDs in the grille will change color and pattern according to the vehicle’s function - it will be possible to tell from distance the car is in autonomous mode for example. The front grille will also light up as an emergency light and will show battery charging status among many other features.

The Ioniq 6 will benefit from a larger (77.4 kWh) battery pack from the Ioniq 5 Long Range and it will have the performance N version for the first time as well. It will be most likely based on the Kia EV6 GT technology with a 585 hp AWD setup.

All legacy automakers were slow to the start of the EV race but are catching up really quickly. This is an economy of scale and those with huge manufacturing plants have the size advantage. Hyundai knew this and was watching the race from the sidelines before deciding to join in. Now it is on route to sell 160,000 electric cars this year across 8 different models and it is planning to expand the range to 12 models by 2025 with 560,000 vehicles slotted for sale in that year.

Via