Yahoo Autos Mercedes Doesn't Want Its EVs to Be Shaped Like Eggs Anymore
The current crop of Mercedes EVs are not exactly known for any kind of angular styling, but the egg-shaped EQ lineup is at least low on drag. The designs are a major departure from the stiff shapes that Mercedes produced over its first hundred years. Thankfully, that departure may not be going on much longer.
In an interview with Top Gear, Mercedes VP of Car Engineering Christoph Starzynski suggests that future Mercedes EVs will look less like the EQS and more like the recent CLA Concept. While it may not exactly have the classic lines of a W108 S-class, that car at least has a prominent grille shape and something closer to a typical three-box sedan design. It also has Mercedes logo-shaped LED headlights, but not every car can be perfect.
Starzynski also says that the brand's naming system for EVs is slowly moving away from the current standard of putting EQ in front of a model designation. He claims that "the zipper will close" on that system as the brand adopts more EVs, meaning that electric variants will simply get the traditional name for their size and segment.
The change in naming would be welcome. A gas-powered Mercedes mid-sized or full-sized sedan is an E-Class or S-Class and the equivalent SUV is a GLS. If you want an EV, however, you are looking at an EQE, an EQS, or an EQS SUV. The EQ modifier takes preference over both the size and style of the car, making for confounding names that require buyers to stop and think about what they are looking at. By getting back to naming cars after their size and segment first rather than style of propulsion, Mercedes should help potential buyers make some sense of their lineup. That process could begin with the electric version of the G-Wagen, which has been highlighted in recent marketing but has conspicuously not used the EQG name revealed on the first electric G concept in 2021.
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