Ferrari's Electric Future

Whatever you think about Ferrari, it’s undeniably the world’s greatest exotic car brand. In recent times it’s also become a massively profitable commercial behemoth. It’s producing vastly more cars than ever before, and this doesn’t yet seem to have soiled the brand’s perceived exclusivity. But I think the electric car revolution presents a more serious threat to Ferrari than to perhaps any other brand.

Ferrari certainly understands what it stands for, its enduring prestige is built on a clear identity and a rich swashbuckling history. Vigorous, rarefied and melodious. As mainstream car electrification became a real prospect during the tenure of Luca di Montezemolo, his position was admirably clear. According to a Yahoo Autos report in 2013 he said Ferrari “…will never manufacture an electric car as long as I'm chairman”. ‘You pay for the engine, I will give the rest of the car for free’ as Old Man Enzo is reputed to have said. So can a car from Maranello be a Ferrari without its visceral centrepiece? I don’t think it can be, at least not as we know it. Ferrari themselves, until quite recently, appeared to know this too.

In 2021 Ferrari’s then CEO announced plans to release the first fully electric Ferrari supercar in 2025. Tellingly this was at a shareholders meeting of the now publicly traded company. Benedetto Vigna (the current CEO) said the car will be “…unique, a true Ferrari” in his 2022 Top Gear magazine interview. But is this is really possible? Painful accelerative performance and enormous levels of grip are commonplace when it comes to serious performance EVs, their capabilities are totally inaccessible on the public highway (which is also true of many modern ICE cars). Raising these limits further will not a unique experience make. What more can Ferrari offer to break this banal EV mould and inject the charisma of a ‘true Ferrari’? The variables are limited.

Batteries will become lighter however and perhaps Ferrari would have the confidence to make a lighter and less powerful EV, maybe even one with lower grip levels aimed at the thrill seeking enthusiast. However I suspect a Ferrari badge, an enormous price tag and all the latest gimmicks will likely be enough to sell frivolous 2000 horsepower EV supercars and ‘FUVs’ by the container load.

Perhaps the unfortunate truth is that not having an all electric Ferrari in the pipeline would be to neglect their shareholders’ interests. For a publicly traded company the necessity to maximise profits must win. Even Ferrari can’t know how legislation on ICE cars around the globe will change. It may not be possible to market new combustion engined cars from 2035 in the EU, though here’s hoping synthetic carbon-neutral fuels and evolving perceptions may yet come to the rescue.

But however inevitable the all electric Ferrari was, what petrolheads may soon witness is a storied brand flogged and denuded for commercial gain. Whilst the petrol powered back catalogue matures in treasured collections, who will hanker to own and maintain the hordes of soulless used Ferrari EVs, obsolescent and degrading whilst new and improved models appear thick and fast? I suspect many will be quietly recycled as consumerism and greed eventually destroy all that Ferrari ever stood for, but not before an enormous amount of profit is generated from the world’s wealthiest people.

Or perhaps there will be a cheap supply of reliable used electric Ferraris, who knows!