An overwhelming global reaction to the German sports car specialist's first hybrid supercar has provided the power for a production go-ahead. So that's the good news. But the bad news for Australia is there is zero chance of local sales.
The Porsche 918 will only be built in left-hand drive and the only Aussies with a hope of landing one of the 900-ish production cars - probably 918 to match its type number - are collectors who do not plan to drive it on local roads.
"The reality is that the market here would be extremely limited. And we are the only right-hand drive market in the world where you cannot register a left-hand drive car," says Michael Winkler, managing director of Porsche Cars Australia. "So it's left-hand drive only."
Winkler says there were several strong responses in Australia to the car and he still sees the potential for a couple of sales. "Collectors will always be interested," he says.
The 918 Spyder is the spiritual successor to Porsche's previous road-going supercar, the Carrera GT.
Few details have been made public but it is intended to have a 0-100km//h sprint time of less than four seconds and a top speed in the 300km/h region. But, just as importantly, Porsche says the 918 will have a fuel consumption of around 3 litres/100km and CO2 emissions of just 70 grams/kilometre.
Porsche has only built a single 918 Spyder for motor show display work and Winkler says the real work on its plug-in hybrid drive system is just about to begin. He forecasts a minimum three-year development time.
"The motor show car works. But it's very much prototype components. There is only one," Winkler says. "The production date hasn't been set yet, but there is some detailed development work still to be done, particularly in the battery technology and the cost of that technology. If you produced the car today the cost would be prohibitive. But in three or four years time things will have improved. Development is going ahead in leaps and bounds, and it takes that long anyway to get some of those components reliable enough for everyday use."
Development of the 918 Spyder will be based at Porsche's development centre in Weissach and it will be built in the company's main factory in Zuffenhausen. There is no talk yet of a race program and Winkler says it is unlikely to be a track car. "No. it needs to go through all the development stages," he says.
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