Polestar has seen downs and ups this year, and it appears there is more of the latter in the pipeline as it is expanding its retail presence in seven additional markets across Europe, Latin America as well as Asia, the EV brand has announced.
“Expanding our retail operations with new and existing partners will enable us to reach more customers. Through these partnerships and expansion, we will capitalise on our strong brand and growing model line-up,” Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath said.
The new markets to be entered by Polestar are France, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Poland, Thailand and Brazil, which the brand will enter through local distribution partnerships, Polestar stated. Thailand marks the brand’s second market in the Asean region after Singapore, which the brand entered in late-2021.
Existing retail operations for the brand in Sweden and Norway switched to a “non-genuine agency sales model” earlier this month, said Polestar, adding that other key markets are due to follow suit in the second half of this year. Customers will still be able to configure and order Polestar vehicles online, as well as through Polestar Spaces and service locations, said the brand.
The brand’s expansion plans should be welcome news following the company’s workforce-cutting plans which it announced in January after it had missed its sales target for 2023, selling 54,600 units in that year; short of the 60,000-unit target it had set, which was itself revised down from the 80,000-unit target initially set at the beginning of 2023.
In March, Polestar announced that it had secured US$950 million (RM4.5 billion) in external funding 12 international banks including BNP Paribas, Natixis, Standard Chartered, BBVA, HSBC and SPDB, through a three-year loan. will provide Polestar with the funds required to finance the carmaker’s next stage of development, it said.
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