Oooooooooooor, they are just good engineers and shape the car around the drive train. The id3 is spacious like a big car in the footprint of a small car. No engine means you can move the cabin forward, hatchback means extra trunk space and headspace for the second row.

Everyone in Europe is happy about getting more space in a smaller car. And this compact car shape is common here as well.

The car is completely normal and good looking. Limousines and SUV are not the only valid shapes for cars.

> Seems like they want this to fail to keep ICE and all the supporting industries alive for more $$

That doesn't make sense. They are not spending tens of billions of euros on a project they want to fail.

In any case, the world's two biggest car markets (Europe and China) are introducing stricter fleet emissions standards. If car companies want to stay in the car business they have to electrify to meet the new standards.

It's a matter of urgency for Volkswagen so they can avoid as many EU emissions fines as possible. Paying fines is just dead money. You're much better off investing that money in new car models, which is what Volkswagen is doing.

Toyota's in a better position to meet the standards because they sell a lot of hybrid vehicles.

I don't think your tinfoil hat theory is so far-fetched. Like every other car company before Tesla, they've optimized for ICE cars. From their perspective, the ideal scenario would be that the electric car trend dies out as a fad, leaving their core business (ICE cars) unaffected.

It's pretty far fetched. There's money in service but not for VW or any other OEM. The dealers make money on service. The OEM makes money on cars and financing. It wouldn't surprise me if subtracting warranty from parts sales resulted in a net negative for many models. I'm painting with a broad brush here but that's the gist of it. Going all EVs would simplify a heck of a lot of things for the OEMs.

I think Tesla has shown that if the current car makers don't get on the electric bandwagon fast enough, they are going to be left behind.