1 best of : Volvo Has More Cross Country, EV Models in Store for U.S.

Volvo is not resting on its laurels with its hit XC90 (our 2016 Motor Trend SUV of the Year) and accolades for the follow-up S90 sedan. Under Chinese ownership, the Swedish automaker is embracing both its roots and a future to be dominated by electric and self-driving vehicles.

We spent some time with Lex Kerssemakers, president and CEO of Volvo Cars USA, and some of his executive team on a recent program to highlight the automaker’s commitment to its Cross Country vehicles that give regular sedans and wagons extra ground clearance to navigate the harsh Scandinavian terrain and climate. Here are some of the areas where Volvo is hard at work:

Cross Country: In addition to the S60 and V60 Cross Country sedan and wagon, Volvo is gearing up to add the first-ever V90 Cross Country to the lineup early next year to partially fill the gap left by the smaller V70 and XC70 that have been discontinued. Cross Country models appeal to a specific, outdoorsy audience and have Volvo’s most loyal customers.

XC60: The 60-series still rides on the old EUCD platform from the days when Volvo was a Ford brand. When the second-generation XC60 arrives for the 2018 model year it will have switched to Volvo’s global Scalable Platform Architecture (SPA) that has been acclaimed in the XC90 and S90 and will soon spawn the V90. SPA was designed to incorporate Volvo’s Drive-E four-cylinder turbocharged engines and electrical infrastructure as well as all-wheel drive. It will also give the XC60 a wider stance and more efficient design which adds up to more cargo room. Kerssemakers says Volvo has big ambitions for the XC60 and it is part of the brand’s turnaround in the U.S.

40-Series: The current V40 has been on sale in Europe for four years but was not available in the U.S. Volvo is creating the next-generation 40-series small cars on a new platform called Compact Modular Architecture or CMA and a new direct-injected 1.5-liter turbocharged three-cylinder engine for its hybrids and to augment its four-cylinder and diesel engines. The first of a family of 40-series vehicles that will include gasoline, diesel, plug-in hybrids, and pure electric drivetrains, are slated to go into production in 2017, and this time the compacts are headed to the U.S. Although we might be waiting until early 2019.

Electric vehicles: Volvo expects to launch its first fully electric vehicle in 2019, part of a larger target of 1 million electrified vehicles by 2025. Kerssemakers said it is too early to say what size vehicle will be the first EV. Odds say it will come initially from the more-established SPA platform which will already host a number of plug-in hybrids, followed quickly by the 40-series of small cars. Kerssemakers said in the evolution from plug-in hybrids to fully electric, the pivot point will occur when batteries are affordable. Volvo will be able to react quickly with its lineup of modular vehicles on platforms designed to accommodate all powertrains.

Diesels for the U.S.: There will never be Volvos with diesel engines in the U.S., Kerssemakers said. The idea was considered with the 90-series but the automaker decided electrification was better.

Polestar: Volvo is working on Polestar variants of the S90 and V90 with hybrid powertrains engineered to deliver up to 600 horsepower. The question is whether 90-series vehicles that received the high-performance tuner treatment will make it to the U.S. Volvo sells about 200-250 V60 and S60 Polestars a year in the U.S., Kerssemakers says. He personally would love a V90 Polestar but knows “it’s expensive to do and there is not a huge market.” But that is what makes it exclusive.

Autonomous vehicles: The goal is no deaths or serious accidents in a new Volvo by 2020. “We can’t do it without autonomous drive because the majority of accidents are caused by human mistakes,” Kerssemakers said.

Volvo is also actively involved in autonomous ride sharing. The automaker has Concept 26, a driverless car concept that keeps evolving. The DriveMe project in Gothenburg will put 100 self-driving cars in public hands next year in a controlled environment. Volvo partnered with chipmaker NVIDIA which has a deep-learning self-driving computing platform. In another deal, Volvo sold cars to Uber which equipped them for testing in Pittsburgh in the first step of a cooperation between the two companies. They are also setting up a center in the Bay area for joint development to come. Kerssemakers likes the cooperation because it expands the scope of development and allows Volvo to learn from another high-tech company. It is an opportunity to see how others approach development and gauge how the hardware fits. Volvo also wants to develop software and has entered a partnership with AutoLiv to work on advanced driver assistance systems.