Cadillac to Release Luxury EV

In an effort to reestablish its status as a top luxury car producer, Cadillac has unveiled Monday a hand-built, bespoke behemoth fastback sedan - the electric Cadillac Celestiq.

The vehicle, which returns to the 1960s land yacht era and has a weight on par with the Escalade, will start at a whopping $300,000 and be built at GM’s Global Technical Center in Warren, Michigan. The concept of the EV was unveiled in July, the prototype was shown in August.

We are going to continue to earn our way back up to the top of the luxury market and return Cadillac to the pinnacle of luxury,

Rory Harvey, global vice president of Cadillac, told TechCrunch.

Cadillac has previously said it planned to only make 500 vehicles. However, at the presentation company representatives said that it intends to keep making the Celestiq for years to come, suggesting that the final sales tally could eclipse that initial figure.

Cadillac says that the Celestiq will travel 0 to 100 km/h in around 3.8 seconds. The company also says that on DC Fast charging, the Celestiq will gain as much as 78 miles of range in only 10 minutes.

The company has introduced an innovative battery layout. The dedicated EV architecture combines a 111-kWh battery pack and a two-motor, all-wheel-drive system. GM estimates that the Celestiq will put out 600 horsepower and 640 pound-feet of torque and get around 300 miles on a full charge.

One of the most challenging aspects of designing the Celestiq was packaging a good-looking body around all of the technology,

Erin Crossley, the Design Director for Celestiq said.

This technology includes everything from the fixed glass roof that has four separate panels that can be individually turned opaque, patterned, or open, to the 55-inch diagonal screen that stretches across the dash of the Celestiq.