It’s probably the biggest and most important car show in the world at present, and the annual Geneva Motor Show is one of the best opportunities for car and technology companies to display their latest and greatest wares to the world.
But, with virtually all of the world’s largest car manufacturers all bunched together in one massive convention centre, it’s also usually one of the best ways to gauge the direction in which the car industry is headed in the next few years.
Of course, the biggest industry news from this year’s show was the announcement of the PSA Group’s takeover of Vauxhall/Opel, announced just a day prior to the opening. But aside from that, here are five of the biggest things we learned from this year’s show.
Niche products are the new mainstream
Usually, at large motor shows like Geneva the more niche products are usually relegated to one corner on the floor; that’s stuff like oddball tuner cars, small low-volume marques and other products considered too small or too weird to be displayed front and centre.
But this year saw cars from the likes of Mansory, Liberty Walk and Gemballa sharing much of the downstairs floorspace nestled in alongside big-name manufacturers like BMW, Jaguar, Peugeot, Mercedes-Benz and Citroen.
Upstairs you could find oddities like spherical tyres and a car resembling a colossal Morgan Aero 8 inspired by – we’re not kidding – a Hercule Poirot adventure, sharing space with the latest, greatest hypercars of the current era.
It seems people are getting more interested in interesting things, whether it’s the retro-tastic British GT cars from David Brown Automotive or some of the more, err, controversial displays from the likes of FAB Design.
Niche, it seems, is the new mainstream. It also raises interesting questions about the value of shows. Major manufacturers seem to be turning away from motor shows; many big-name companies from Ford to Lamborghini neglected to have any sort of display at last year’s Paris Motor Show.
In their wake, smaller companies seem to be stepping in, but even fielding a small display at Geneva would be massively expensive, putting further strain on the finances of less wealthy firms. Is it worth the trouble? They seem to think so.
Driverless cars are naturally a big focus
Driverless cars are quickly becoming an impending inevitability which car manufacturers are having to accept whether they want to or not, and many marques took the opportunity to display their vision of a world where robots do most of the driving.
Concepts ranged from Toyota’s i-TRIL, a three-seater electric city car that has driverless capabilities and a similar design to the earlier i-Road, to the Peugeot Instinct, a gorgeous autonomous shooting brake with suicide doors that’s connected to the Internet of Things.
Many manufacturers postulate that driverless cars won’t take over full time. Ford, BMW, Alfa Romeo and others remain committed to the notion that human beings simply enjoy driving too much, and see a future where AI systems can remove the hassle of commuting while making things more fun when it’s your turn to take over.
Others take a more radical stance, and it’s also a reflection of the changing shape of the industry that many companies typically unassociated with the business of making cars still showed up with their own concept vehicles.
Take Airbus, for example, better known for its aeroplanes but which unveiled the Pop.Up concept at Geneva – a fully autonomous pod which can connect to a giant set of drone rotors to create what it calls the world’s first driverless flying car.
As is electrification
Of course, there was only one thing weighing more heavily on the minds of manufacturers than driverless cars, and that could only be the ongoing shift towards electrified powertrains.
Virtually every major manufacturer’s stand featured some sort of electric/hybrid car, a concept, or at least some sort of plan for the future. Honda announced that by 2025 two-thirds of its cars will be sold with an alternative-fuel powertrain, be it hydrogen powered, hybrid or pure electric.
Even Bentley, famed for its massive V12 engines, unveiled the really rather gorgeous EXP 12 Speed 6e concept, a pure-electric two-door roadster that aims to preview the direction the luxury carmaker could take in coming years.
Renault also unveiled the brilliant ZOE E-Sport, a 456bhp four-wheel drive electric hot hatch. Unfortunately, just like the much-loved Clio RS 16 concept, don’t expect to see an E-Sport on sale anytime soon.
But it’s not just standard battery electric cars, as the stands showed off plenty of amazing alternatives to the battery model. Take, for example the Quant 48Volt, an electric supercar that ditches the battery packs in favour of deriving electricity from what it calls ‘liquid electrolytes’ – basically salty water.
The real star of the electric car displays though was the Techrules GT96, designed by Giorgetto Giugiaro and developed by Chinese research company Techrules. It’s under the skin where the GT96 is most interesting though, as its electric motors are fed extra power from a gigantic jet turbine fuelled by aerospace-grade kerosene.
But drivers’ cars aren’t going anywhere
Yet with all this talk of autonomous driving, electric cars and whatnot, you might think that driving as a pastime, as a thing to be enjoyed, is on the way out. Not so, judging by the sheer amount of high-horsepower, high-thrills machinery on display at this year’s Geneva show.
The biggest headliners from this year’s show were undisputedly the McLaren 720S, Lamborghini Huracan Performante and the Ferrari 812 Superfast, but even more affordable cars like the Alpine A110, Honda Civic Type R and Ford Fiesta ST prove that there’s still life left in the performance car market.
There were some big plans from other manufacturers too, like Aston Martin’s decision to create the AMR division, essentially Aston’s equivalent of BMW M and Mercedes AMG. Toyota likewise announced its plans to return to the performance car market with a three-pronged lineup consisting of the GT86, Supra and an MR2 successor, while it also unveiled the Yaris GRMN hot hatch.
From Audi to INFINITI, Skoda to Koenigsegg, there were few manufacturers at this year’s Geneva Motor Show that didn’t debut some sort of go-faster car, while Porsche’s decision to equip the next 911 GT3 with a manual gearbox puts paid to the notion that drivers still want the ability to do the driving for themselves.
By the looks of things, the car market will follow a two-direction split in years to come. More everyday cars will include more and more autonomous equipment, while the cars designed purely to be driven will become ever more hardcore. And that happens to make us very happy indeed.
Vegan and veggie-friendly cars are on the rise
Everything else aside, it’s not just electrified cars that are aiming to be environmentally friendly, with a number of manufacturer’s at this year’s show producing concepts and options for the more eco-conscious buyer.
Rinspeed, perhaps best known for its tuned Porsches and Subarus, unveiled its Oasis concept at this year’s show, a small autonomous hatchback which comes with a small garden planter mounted on top of the dashboard.
It might seem like a bit of a gimmick, but the Swiss company says there’s enough room to grow the likes of Bonsai trees or even a small vegetable patch for things like carrots or radishes. The idea is to make the most of the space available, particularly in the densely-packed urban environments autonomous cars will operate in.
Likewise, the Catecar Dragonfly is a unique vehicle which is built largely from bio-plastics derived from vegetable fibres, which is designed to offer a glimpse at the future of sustainable transport. The Dragonfly also features a solar roof, which can add 2.5 miles to the car’s range for every hour of sunlight it absorbs.
Despite not being veggies or vegans ourselves, we have previously written about the lack of available options in the car market for those who are, with many cars these days now coming with things like leather seats and steering wheels as standard.
Some vehicles do offer vegan-friendly options, most notably the Tesla Model S, but at this year’s Geneva show Jaguar Land Rover announced that it too would officially start to offer options better suited to those who want an upmarket vehicle but that isn’t swathed in cow hides.
The first JLR vehicle to offer this will be the new Range Rover Velar, which will be available with a leather-free interior option that will use high-quality textiles made by Danish textile manufacturer Kvadrat.
Part wool, part polyester, JLR says that the new textile option is as hard-wearing as any leather while still being stylish and eye-catching. As well as being appealing for a generation of young veggies and vegans, it’s also expected to be a hit in the upcoming Indian market, where leather interiors are understandably something of a no-no.
It’s a small thing, but then the idea of autonomous driving or even electric/hybrid cars once seemed like a tiny niche, and it’ll be interesting to see how it develops throughout the wider market in years to come.