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Cadillac Celestiq electric sedan could top $200,000

General Motors teased a slew of new electric vehicles last week at a media event where cameras weren’t allowed, and now thereÂ’s more news about the Celestiq, one of the two EVs in the pipeline for Cadillac. Reports suggest it wonÂ’t come cheap and will retail for at least $200,000. Wall Street Journal auto writer Mike Colias dished that detail, along with word of a mid-2020 launch, on Twitter, attributing it directly to Cadillac President Steve Carlisle. Cadillac has made no official mention of starting price for either the Celestiq luxury sedan or the Lyriq, an EV SUV that it has previously teased. A spokesman told Autoblog the brand wouldnÂ’t comment on future product speculation. Leftover scraps from Cadillac flagship ‘CelestiqÂ’ news: ItÂ’ll be hand-built in the hundreds per year, Caddy chief Steve Carlisle said. Price? Six figures Â… “and it wonÂ’t have a 1 in front of it.” Due mid-2022. — Mike Colias (@MikeColias) March 5, 2020 If true, the six-figure MSRP would make the Celestiq the most expensive Caddy ever assembled, at least outside of one-off coach builds and the presidential limo, vaunting it into the same class as brands like Bentley, Lamborghini and Rolls-Royce. By way of comparison, the limited-edition ultra-luxury 1957 Cadillac Eldorado Brougham four-door debuted with a $13,074 price tag, the most expensive car of its day and the equivalent of around $120,000 in todayÂ’s dollars. So what do we know about the Celestiq? For starters, itÂ’ll be a halo flagship hand-built in limited quantities somewhere in the Detroit area. Our reporters who saw the white four-seater describe it as having a long, fastback roofline, no side mirrors or visible door handles, with a long wheelbase, short overhangs and a tinted glass roof. A rendering of the interior showed an LED instrument cluster and infotainment display that stretches between both A pillars, with touchscreen interfaces on the rear of the front seats. It also reportedly features a hatch instead of a conventional trunk and styling cues from the Escala concept from 2016, shown above. Cadillac teased it as the “ultimate luxury experience” and said it would be highly customizable. Cadillac also showed off the Lyriq, the name itÂ’s given to its midsize electric crossover that it had previously promised to unveil in April, possibly at the New York Auto Show, if it manages to happen given the coronavirus.

Cadillac still planning for big things in China

Despite some hiccups, China remains the auto industry's great hope for new vehicle sales, with significant sales gains and a huge upside. Nowhere is that hope more fervent than at General Motors, which offers eight different marques in the Asian nation. China has been GM's single biggest market the last three years running, and is unlikely to give up that title anytime soon. Yet its premiere brand, Cadillac, has remained essentially stagnant, selling just 30,000 units in China last year. That's in a segment where sales of luxury vehicles has outpaced that of the larger Chinese market. So what gives?
According to Cadillac officials Autoblog spoke with in China this week at the Shanghai Motor Show, it's been a problem of product - they haven't had the right ones. Displacement taxation issues, import tariffs and currency fluctuations have all conspired to make the brand's products less appealing than they might otherwise have been. But GM is stepping on the gas with Cadillac, and executives are eyeballing 100,000 sales by 2016 - more than triple the Wreath and Crest's current volume. And the expectations for the brand only get more ambitious from there - they're shooting for 10 percent of the luxury market by 2020. Bob Socia, President of GM China, promises that there will be a new Caddy launched in the market each year from now through 2016 and most will be built in China. Characterizing the company's efforts to revive the brand's fortunes as a "relaunch" of sorts, Cadillac also figures to gain dealers as GM expands its sales outlet footprint westward.
New products like a made-in-China XTS sedan (with a market-specific 2.0-liter four-cylinder to avoid heavy displacement taxes) will help, and Socia hinted that the ATS sport sedan could be next in line for in-country production. The SRX crossover - currently the brand's best-selling model in China - will also likely get a long look for future local production when the next-generation model is introduced. In the meantime, Cadillac unveiled the Escalade ESV Hybrid (shown above) as its latest model addition to capitalize on the market's white-hot luxury SUV segment.

GM announces six new recalls, covering 3.5 million vehicles

General Motors has just initiated another crushingly large recall, this time affecting some 3.36 million vehicles built between 2000 and 2014 and sold in the US, Canada and Mexico. Once again, the issue surrounds the cars' ignition switches, which can be kicked out of the run position if they're carrying extra weight or if they experience a "jarring" event. In this particular case, though, GM will modify the keys, rather than the ignition itself.
A four-by-six-millimeter hole will be drilled into the key, which will more safely accommodate the weight of the key ring. As is usually the case, the work will be done free of charge. The recalled vehicles include the 2000 to 2005 Cadillac Deville, 2004 to 2005 Buick Regal LS and GS, 2004 to 2011 Cadillac DTS, 2005 to 2009 Buick Lacrosse, 2006 to 2008 Chevrolet Monte Carlo, 2006 to 2011 Buick Lucerne and 2006 to 2014 Chevrolet Impala. Only the Impala is still in production, and even then, it's only sold to fleet companies.
According to an official statement from GM, there have been eight crashes and six injuries due to this latest issue. As if this isn't a dire enough blow for GM, the company has announced five smaller recalls, covering 165,000 vehicles.