New-chapter Smart abandons its roots and goes after style-conscious EV buyers instead
Handsome though it undoubtedly is, the Smart #3 is the kind of car to make you wonder just what its reimagined manufacturer is really all about.Funnily enough, if you’d asked me while I was still at the wheel, I’m fairly sure I’d have been none the wiser. But with the benefit of a little detached perspective, it’s becoming clearer which direction ‘the new Smart’ – the brand as refounded in 2019 and co-funded by Mercedes-Benz and Chinese giant Geely – is headed off in.Clearly, this is no longer the maker of innovative microcars that it once was. And from a business perspective at the very least, that might not be such a bad thing. Still, if you were on a mission to show the world that you had the same fearless spirit that fathered the most bold and singular small car of the last half-century, this just isn’t what you’d do.We might let them off the decision to kick-start the revival with an electric compact crossover, the Smart #1. Sooner or later, they will need to sell some cars, after all. But to move next to a larger, lower, more expensive and more desirable mid-sized coupé-crossover like the Smart #3 – a rival for anything from the Polestar 2 to the Volvo C40 Recharge, the Tesla Model 3 or even the Cupra Born – hardly says ‘I’m innovative’, does it? It hardly says ‘pick me, I’m different’.Right now, where mid-sized EVs are concerned, I’m not sure that we even know what different looks like – but this certainly isn’t it.
Source: Autocar
