I have a dream - about hypercars, the wall posters of my childhood and the future of electric vehicles

Today I felt compelled to write something - that's why I got in front of the keyboard and this is how this piece came about. I watched the Tesla Motors 2020 battery day and felt that I needed to mark this point in time where themes such as energy sources, technology, science, the environment are shaping the automotive future in so many exciting ways. I have always loved cars for the sake of cars and I embrace change as long as it embodies some of my pre-requisites for what makes a car appealing and a future of autonomous “Pods” is not my preferred vision. I also heard a speech by the CEO of the VW Group talking about, artificial intelligence to "Steer the Car" and "Shells for Transportation". I hear nothing in these words about human interaction and control of the machine for pleasure - and even less for challenge or sport. This leads me to hypercars. In an era of robotics and digitization, where pretty much everything is based on pragmatism, we shouldn’t forget how to value great design, driving experience, craftsmanship, individualization, touch & feel etc. and for all these emotional aspects – the hypercar is the ultimate expression and reminder and I hope the modern consumers will keep their standards high as to which cars they choose, disregarding price, size and performance. Hypercars - although a superlative – are an important reminder of cars being more than just a means of transportation. That’s why I admire them and their creators – for keeping my passion alive and many of you out there - I assume? They go beyond logic and necessity and provide a strong individual statement for what is possible and most importantly, the technology they possess filters down to mainstream products over time. It is this influence that I find invaluable. Lastly they give people something to aspire to, something to dream about. Like I dreamed of the cars on my wall posters.

Not everyone will understand this and I accept that.

Not everyone will share my point of view. Indeed many will just have the physical need to transport themselves from one place to the other. Many would rather spend their time relaxing or working, than observing the road and shifting their attention to the experience of driving. In some situations, even from my stand-point, it might make sense to allow the car to drive autonomously on high-ways e.g. People might think "Cool, I want a car with a collapsible steering wheel, that neatly folds aways in to the dashboard to allow more legroom, when the cars is being auto-piloted during my nap". Already today, we are experiencing this "purpose indivualization" more and more, through various driving settings and cars being able to switch mode and adapt to different purposes and conditions, which is great! I am making the argument, that we should use technology to enhance our experience and not to limit ourselves. Let's make transportation sustainable, let's make cars safe and efficient, but please let's keep cars as machines, that we interact with - not just control.

Which questions do we need to ask - to get it right?

So my point is - how do we keep building cars that are - engaging to drive and that still provide a connected feeling, to the road surface through the car, to our surroundings, to our senses in general - while we keep developing technology, that will potentially distance us from the driving experience? How do we preserve an analogue/mechanical feeling in an electric car? I think the motorsports and the sportscar industry will help us answer these questions going forward and that's why I find it relevant to look towards the hypercar.

Why preserve the emotional connection to cars?

In these times, we are all very preoccupied with the digital universe to such an extent, that we are distracting ourselves from being present enough to actually experience life and living, but is it really al about making things more practical, reachable and convinient without really savoring moments or actually being present in the moment? I was pondering on this question. Then it struck me, that a car's appeal can be based on so many things - some definetely of a more practical nature than emotional, so therefore we might see the development of cars go in two very different directions, one direction for the ones, who enjoy piloting a car and another for the ones with just the basic need for transportation. The emotional connection also exists through something, that is a conscious choice and priority in your life and for those exact reasons, you have made your car a personal object - in many ways it's like a love story. Initially you were drawn to its appearance, you then went a layer deeper to gain more knowledge about it - in many cases with supercars or hypercars it's been a crush of yours for many, many years. Bottomline - the future sportscar enthusiast will still insist on products, that go beyond gadgets and convinience features - It is this realization that will still determine the success of sportscar manufacturers going forward and that is why we need to develop "Emotional Connectivity". So in other words allow our senses to guide us. Insist on materials being sustainable and light, but also insist on materials being aesthecially pleasing, nice to touch and feel and that they should communicate a sense of quality and craftsmanship. If we take this approach towards everything we see, feel,smell and hear in a car, we will continue to create astonishing automotive machines in the future.

When did the hypercar story start for me?

I started thinking the other day, what was my first experience with a hypercar and what might really be the inspiration for creating something superior to a supercar? The first questions is, for some reason, the answer to the last one. The AMG CLK GTR was my very first experience in a hypercar, which was a car, that was derived and developed from Le Mans and the LMP1 class, built primarily by HWA as a motorsports project, but also spawned a very limited number of homologated road-legal units. My assumption would be that the LMP1 prototypes were definitely frontrunners for the hypercar we see today. At a later point in time, I had the chance to get a detailed look at a Koenigsegg CCXR and not too long ago, I experienced the “Battista” from Automobili Pininfarina. Each of these cars represent their very own and significant evolutionary steps in hypercar development – the CLK GTR with its NA 7-litre V12 and 612 hp. and the CCXR with its 4.8-litre twin supercharged flexfuel driveline and 1.081 hp. and finally the “Battista” full-electric car with 1.904 hp. – These cars each represent some truly interesting milestones in hypercar history from petrol, to flexfuel and the option to run on bioethanol to full-electric drive over a time span of 22 years. So where are we headed from here? One things is for sure, we will still desire objects of beauty, we will be drawn to an emotional connection to machines, that reflect our personal taste.

What inspired me to write this piece?

At a point in life where I am witnessing a significant change in a business and a sector, that I have devoted most of my life to, I am left wondering about the following things. In a time where the 300 mph. top speed record for a production car has been broken, we are today seeing passenger cars that have sub 3 second 0-60 mph. acceleration times, within a year it will be well below 2 seconds, what goals do we have left to explore and are there any barriers left to break from a performance standpoint? Autonomous driving capability is one of the large focuses of many automotive brands, are we actually contributing to a driverless future and are we creating cars, that are surpassing our ability to safely pilot them? I admit that based on my age and my background, my view might be skewed towards the fact, that I actually like driving and I actually like being in control of a vehicle – I wouldn’t want to let a computer chauffeur me! I definitely like the challenge of driving a car around a track, the drama, the emotions, the forces on my body – I drive for fun and enjoyment, so are we going to finally let go of the steering wheel in a time where the evolution of the automobile is at its very pinnacle? These are questions that often haunt me, because of the simple fact, that I wouldn’t want the incentive to drive a car for sports or just outright fun to disappear! Based on that, I conclude, that sports cars and motorsports are important sources of technology and inspiration for the rest of the automotive industry and most importantly – it is the emotional bond between man and machine, that we need to enhance to include as much fun and engagement as possible, not limit for the sake of safety and effectiveness alone – that’s not driving and that’s not living either, that’s just transport. Remember we sometimes feel alive through the loss of control, so the future of automotive needs to find a balance between these elements – in other words - experience versus control.

What do we have to work with?

Don’t get me wrong, technology that enhances our driving experience and abilities and aids us in our driving to assist and guide us to precision, I find very relevant – we can’t all be professional drivers! Technology like augmented reality will be able to visually guide us to the quickest way to turn in through the apex or the optimum route through a race track and is really cool. We don’t want limiting factors, we desire technology that allows us to push levels of performance even further, based on our skillset and driving preferences. The electric driveline opens up a plethora of possibilities through torque vectoring in regards to driving dynamics of a car. I see a clear trend in working further with driving individualization through programs, that personalize your driving experience based on conditions and mood. We can't all be millonaires either, so we need to insist on an EV-future, where products will exist that are aestethic with a strong identity and still allow techology in cars to be passion-enducing, while still being affordable.

Where does my passion for cars stem from and why are these special times?

As a child, I just fell in love with the shapes and designs of cars. In that sense, I wasn’t much different from many other boys of my age, who all had their model cars prominently displayed on shelves and wall-posters of exotic cars on the walls. Quite early in life, my interest for the technology and the mechanical side of cars flourished - it was like I couldn’t know enough about these amazing machines. I wanted to take it all in, the design process, the engineering behind it – the entire scope of creating these machines from an idea and concept to the finished item – the interest for cars and the technology and creativity, that go into their creation, was all-consuming for me, as it still is today many years and automotive experiences later. I used to love drawing cars, but never pursued that interest any further, then merely appreciating great designs and marveling at them later in my youth, when I visited car shows or even came across special cars parked in the streets. It was always the fascination with proportions, technology and performance - a piece of moving engineering artistry. Undoubtedly this love story with cars was my motivation for pursuing a career within the automotive business and many years later, I look back on many of the experiences and I am immensely grateful for how this mixture of learnings from the luxury- and sports car segments, my background from early pioneering luxury EREV and BEV manufacturers such as Fisker Automotive and Tesla Motors and servicing of and sales to car enthusiasts through the years, have given me an understanding of what the envelope for an exhilarating sports car future could contain. I especially look forward to finding my own match with the current development in the business and my own skillset and experiences.

We are at a pivotal moment in automotive history.

These are exiting times in automotive history. It is in many ways (as I perceive it) being rewritten. The shift to electrification isn’t and hasn’t been a speedy process, but once the ball starts rolling, innovation and new technology will be introduced at a more and more rapid pace. It has taken time for obvious reasons - both the development of EV technology and the adaption of consumers and overall recognition, that we are at a place in time, where the electric mobility revolution is upon us - takes time. The proof, that we are at a pivotal moment in automotive history, is obvious just from the fact, that OEM manufacturers, are buying stakes in and initiating co-development strategies with start-up companies, where some of them have already surpassed the value of established OEM’s. I am thrilled to see how the field of competitors is filling up with new manufactures and as such diversifying the industry and pushing for more and better products.

So here’s a toast to all my fellow automotive professionals and car enthusiasts and an exciting future - let it be sustainable, let it be safe, but please let it still be fun.

Best regards,

Jannik Voss Brogaard