More than 50,000 Outlander Plug-In Hybrid SUVs have now been sold in Europe by Mitsubishi Motors Europe, according to recent reports.
The new sales milestone was achieved just 2 or so years after the launch of the model in the European market, back in October 2013 — the first sale being to a customer in the Netherlands around that time.
The location of that first sale 2 years ago shouldn’t be that surprising, as the Netherlands is the top market for the plug-in hybrid (PHEV) in Europe — with 20,346 units sold there to date. Following behind the Netherlands are: the UK market (#2), with 16,290 units sold; Sweden (#3), with 4,433 units sold; Norway (#4), with 3,797 units sold; Germany (#5), with 3,015 units sold; and France (#6), with 1,594 units sold.
The other sales occurred in the other 28 markets that fall under the category “Europe.” Notably, this category doesn’t include Russia — where the Outlander PHEV SUV sells pretty well as well.
Just Auto provides more:
The Outlander PHEV made its global public debut at the 2012 Paris show and, MME said, “ventured into uncharted territory, creating an all-new segment while solving the traditional ‘range anxiety’ issue of conventional electric cars and adding the real-life convenience of a vast D-Segment SUV”. In the MME34 territory, the PHEV version accounted for 15% of the brand’s volume and 55% of Outlander sales in January to November 2015. The Outlander was face lifted for the 2016 model year.
A lot has changed since then of course, with the Tesla Model X having been launched (for those looking to get an all-electric rather than a PHEV). There’s also the award-winning Volvo XC90 T8, another plug-in hybrid. I’m curious if Outlander PHEV sales can remain as high as they’ve been now that there’s some competition (of a sort).
Also worth noting here, the Outlander PHEV is finally set to launch in the American market in a few months — so that should boost overall sales notably, we presume.
While Toyota chops Rav4EV instead of improving on it, Mitsubishi succeeds with Outlander PHEV. I wonder if Toyota execs feel shamed like in the old days (see Gung Ho the movie)