Fickle company

This is how electric the combustion engine king Mazda wants to become

(Bild: Stephan Schätzl)

Mazda is slowly but mightily starting its internal electric revolution. The courageous Japanese company, which has brought the Wankel engine into the electric age and made the petrol engine self-igniting, is now really embracing the electric wave - late, but still.

The Mazda MX-30 is Mazda's first electric car, but as a pure EV it is not exactly blessed with a long range and with a range extender it is a veritable gulper. As much as we love it: A Wankel engine simply doesn't become a cost-conscious person. Otherwise, there hasn't been much to see in the way of electrification so far.

Now it's starting
Until we recently found a completely new Mazda6 as an electric car at the Auto Show in Beijing. The platform and technology comes from the Chinese cooperation partner Changan, but the design is unmistakably Mazda. The EZ-6 (that's the name of the car in China, see the presentation here) is a beautiful sedan. Allegedly only intended for the Chinese market, the outgoing Managing Director of Mazda Austria, Heimo Egger, did not deny the European launch when asked by Krone, so much so that the car can be expected at Austrian dealerships in early 2025.

The combustion-only Mazda6 will be phased out at the end of 2024, and a combustion successor based on the new rear-wheel drive platform is not expected; it will remain reserved for the CX-60, 70, 80 and 90 SUVs.

But: in China, the EZ-6 will also be available as a plug-in hybrid, which should also be of interest to us. This means that the new 6 Series can also burn fuel. And it will definitely be more economical than the MX-30.

New, own platform planned
However, Mazda is not content with just mashing up other people's technology. Hiroshima also knows that the signs are generally pointing to electricity, even though the company, which continues to develop combustion engines unperturbed and introduced brand new six-cylinder engines just two years ago, has just achieved the best result in its history. 1.24 million cars sold worldwide, profit increase of 45 percent.

In Europe, they only account for 15 percent of global sales, but 30 percent of earnings. And in Austria they are flying the flag particularly high: although the number of units sold is rather low in absolute terms, the market share of 3.1% was recently almost three times as high as the global average. All of this is almost exclusively combustion-based (they also sell two thirds of the MX-30 with a range extender).

So now electric after all: the Group wants to develop an all-electric platform in house by 2027. No details have yet been revealed. In any case, it will be interesting to see whether Mazda is just as creative in the electric sector as it is with combustion engines.