7 Minutes
Volvo is no stranger to reinvention, but its electric-car story has lately looked more like damage control than a victory lap. The EX40 has held up well. The EX90 has been dragged down by software headaches. The EX30, meant to be the brand’s affordable EV breakthrough, got caught in the crossfire of tariffs and a chaotic US rollout. For a company that once talked boldly about leaving combustion behind, the road has been anything but smooth.
Now Volvo is betting on the EX60 to change the mood.
At a New York launch event this week, the Swedish automaker opened US orders for its new compact electric SUV, with customer deliveries due later this summer. Pricing starts at $59,795, placing the EX60 above the gas-powered XC60, Volvo’s best-selling model of all time, but below the plug-in hybrid XC60. That positioning says plenty. In a market where hybrids are still having a moment and pure EVs are facing resistance, Volvo is trying to sit somewhere in the middle without losing momentum.
The timing, however, is tricky. The US EV market is navigating a tougher climate than it has in years, with the federal $7,500 tax credit gone, tariffs pushing prices higher, and buyers becoming more cautious about making the leap to battery power. Globally, electric vehicle sales continue to grow. In America, the picture is less rosy.
Volvo believes the EX60 can succeed on merit, not subsidies.
The company is leaning heavily on the SUV’s headline numbers: up to 400 miles of range, 10 to 80 percent charging in 18 minutes, and a software-first approach designed to keep improving long after the vehicle leaves the showroom. CEO Håkan Samuelsson made that point plainly in New York.
“Is this the right time to introduce an electric car with everything you hear on the market?” he asked. “I would say yes, because we think this car will not be electrified with subsidies or incentives. It will be electrified because we can offer something better to consumers.”
That confidence matters because Volvo’s earlier EV plans have clearly evolved. The brand once said it would stop selling internal-combustion vehicles by 2030. That deadline is no longer set in stone. As demand for EVs has slowed in some markets and charging concerns have lingered, automakers across the industry have stepped back from hard transition targets. Volvo now says it will keep a broader mix in play, including plug-in hybrids and extended-range electric vehicles.
The EX60 is meant to feel like a fresh start rather than a patch job. Anders Bell, Volvo’s chief technology officer, said the SUV was developed from a clean sheet, with none of the old combustion-engine assumptions built into the process. The company rebuilt its engineering around a more modern software-defined architecture, an approach that should, in theory, make the car easier to update and less prone to the kind of problems that have haunted earlier models.
Bell said the hard lessons of recent years have been folded back into the system. “So all the lessons, all the polishing, all the infrastructure, all the learning stuff that has been quite painful over the last few years has now gone into the whole machinery and the whole software,” he said.
That software cadence will be central to the EX60’s appeal. Volvo plans major over-the-air updates every three months, with Bell arguing that stability improves when more vehicles share the same digital backbone. In testing, he said, the EX60 already felt far more mature than previous Volvo EVs did at the same stage.
The competition will be fierce. The Tesla Model Y remains the benchmark for mainstream electric SUVs, while challengers such as the Rivian R2 and BMW iX3 are waiting in the wings with their own claims to relevance. Volvo knows it is entering a crowded field, and it is not pretending otherwise.
Even so, the EX60 is not being pitched as a car for every market on Earth. Samuelsson said Volvo sees the vehicle mainly as a US and European model, reflecting what he described as a global industry increasingly splitting into two camps: one built around China, and another centered on Europe and North America. Volvo does have access to Chinese technology through Geely, its parent company, but its priorities remain firmly Western.
There is also another layer to Volvo’s strategy: hybrids that behave less like traditional hybrids and more like electric cars with a safety net. Samuelsson said the company’s future extended-range EVs will work primarily as EVs, with combustion engines serving as backup for longer journeys. For American buyers who like the idea of electric driving but are not ready to rely on chargers alone, that formula could land well.
Then there is the software angle, where Volvo believes it can carve out a real advantage. The company’s use of Android Automotive as its operating system gives it a strong foundation for deeper AI integration, Bell said. At Google’s I/O conference this week, Volvo announced that the EX60 will gain access to Gemini through its external cameras, allowing the AI assistant to help interpret lane markings and road signs. Volvo also plans to bring Gemini to roughly 2.5 million vehicles dating back to model year 2020 through over-the-air updates.
“We had no idea when those cars would roll out six years ago that we’re going to over-the-air update something called conversational AI to those cars in six years,” Bell said. “We had no idea. That’s what we’re doing now.”
That may be the most revealing part of Volvo’s current pitch. The company is no longer selling a clean ideological break from gasoline. It is selling something more practical, and maybe more realistic: a better electric car, a more flexible hybrid future, and a software platform that can keep learning after launch.
The EX90 still needs software fixes. The EX30 still represents a missed opportunity in the US. But Volvo is plainly hoping the EX60 can turn the page.
“The EX60 will be much more solid,” said Erik Severinson, Volvo’s chief commercial officer. “But also with the number of vehicles that we’re going to sell, the EX60 will be so much bigger then. So more experience, more vehicles, more consumers.”
That is the wager. Not perfection. Not revolution. Just a cleaner, smarter second act.
Source: theverge
Comments
Armin
Nice pivot but feels cautious not bold. Software updates every 3 months ok, but still worried about reliability & charger access. Loooks promising tho.
v8rider
Is this for real? EX60 priced above XC60 but below the PHEV - sounds like hedging, who exactly buys this? mixed signals.
mechbyte
Wow, Volvo swinging for the fences with software-first EX60. If the OTA updates actually work, 400mi range could matter... but kinda skeptical, tbh
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