Acura plans to take advantage of Monterey Car Week in Pebble Beach to unveil the first electric vehicle in its history, the 2024 ZDX SUV. Acura has just announced the official date for the unveiling of its first electric vehicle, the ZDX, a vehicle that will be largely based on the Honda Prologue and built in partnership with General Motors. It will be on August 17, as part of the famous Monterey Car Week event, which is held every year at the prestigious Pebble Beach, California, that the veil will be lifted.
Acura first?
In all likelihood, Honda seems to be prioritizing Acura for its first venture into the electric world. Although the Honda Prologue was announced before its luxury counterpart, everything suggests that it will be the ZDX which will have the merit of being the manufacturer’s first electric vehicle. That being said, the unveiling of the Prologue should take place not long after that of its cousin.
Of course, Acura remains silent on the details of its next battery-powered SUV. On its YouTube channel, the manufacturer announced its unveiling date through a very short video that only shows the front part of the vehicle, clearly inspired by the Precision EV concept that the manufacturer had unveiled, also in August 2022.
However, we know from a reliable source that the ZDX will be built alongside the Cadillac LYRIQ at the General Motors plant in Springhill, Tennessee, and that it will be based on the American giant’s Ultium modular architecture . The modular nature of this platform and its batteries could, however, allow the ZDX to display technical characteristics different from those of its American colleague and, even, of its cousin from Honda. A more capable Type S version is also in the plans.
Last month, a first image of a camouflaged prototype surfaced online, revealing a mid-size SUV that bore a resemblance to the LYRIQ, especially around the doors and window sills. It was at the same time that Acura announced its ambitious intentions to sell 160,000 vehicles in Canada and the United States by the end of 2023. It even claimed that 60% of its total sales would come from electric vehicles during the next few years.
Review
I would be lucky enough to be at Pebble Beach during the events surrounding it, including Monterey Car Week where the ZDX will be unveiled. I will try to approach the vehicle and bring you all the information about it, if possible.
It is indeed a pivotal model in the history of Honda and Acura in North America. If the manufacturer is slow to settle in the segment of electric vehicles with us, it has recently made major investments and major announcements on the fact that it intends to quickly turn its ship on board.
But I’ll believe it when I see it. While I’m optimistic about Honda’s ability to properly market an electric model, Acura’s electric sales projections strike me as far too ambitious. Rather, they give the impression of a builder who bases himself on his past success to project himself into the future.
Admittedly, it is true that Honda’s luxury division currently manages to sell more than 50,000 MDXs on our continent per year without much effort, the market for electric vehicles is quite different, and consumers in this segment do not buy not in the same way as in the world of thermal vehicles. And if the ZDX is sold at a high price because of its luxury label, it’s a safe bet that it won’t qualify for any rebates on the purchase of an electric vehicle.
For the ZDX to be a commercial success, Acura will have to offer a distinctly different and more capable electric vehicle than what is currently offered on the market, such as the Tesla Model Y, the BMW iX, or, again, the imminent Kia EV9, an Electric SUV which already enjoys very high demand.
