Polestar and Koenigsegg announce enigmatic collaboration

Polestar, the brand co-founded by Volvo and Geely, is joining forces with Swedish hypercar manufacturer Koenigsegg to collaborate on a project. Details about the mysterious tie-up are few and far between.

“Something interesting is happening on the west coast of Sweden. Stay tuned,” Polestar wrote on its official Instagram account. Koenigsegg posted a similar message. Each post is accompanied by a photo of the Polestar Precept concept and the Koenigsegg Gemera taken at the same picturesque location somewhere on Sweden’s long coast during the same photo shoot. The social media campaign asks more questions than it answers.

We love the idea of Polestar stuffing the Gemera‘s 1,700-horsepower plug-in hybrid drivetrain (which is built around an engine Koenigsegg amusingly calls The Friendly Giant) into the Precept, but that’s extremely unlikely to happen. Even if we ignore the obvious packaging constraints, the firm pledged it will only build electric cars once it ends production of the Polestar 1, which is limited to 1,500 examples globally. Besides, the Precept isn’t headed to production; it’s a thinly-veiled preview of a crossover likely named Polestar 3 that will make its debut in the early 2020s.

While a drivetrain swap is improbable at best, we can’t imagine Polestar and Koenigsegg would put themselves through the trouble of shipping the Precept and the Gemera to a pretty location and hiring a professional photographer just to see who gets the most likes on Instagram. They’re (hopefully) brewing something with more substance. Both brands dabble in electrification, so they could collaborate on battery technology or electric motors. Carbon fiber is another potential area of collaboration; both use it extensively to keep weight in check. 

It’s easy to speculate Koenigsegg could build an entry-level model on Polestar bones, but company founder Christian von Koenigsegg has previously ruled out expanding into Ferrari territory, so there’s little Polestar could offer it. “We’ll stay higher volume, and with a higher average price than [Ferrari, McMaren, and Aston Martin],” he told Road & Track in 2019. He added he’s open to the idea of developing technology for other firms, however, which might be an important piece of this puzzle. Then again, Polestar has Volvo to learn on for support if needed.

NEVS — the Chinese-Swedish firm that emerged from Saab’s corpse — currently operates a joint-venture with Koenigsegg formed in 2019 to “develop a product for new and untapped segments.” It hasn’t built a car yet, but it might overlap with Polestar once it manages to. It owns a 20% stake in Koenigsegg, so it will be interesting to watch how the hypercar specialist balances its partnerships with two potential rivals that share common roots.

We expect the scope of the partnership will be announced in the coming weeks. In the meantime, we’ll continue to sleuth for more details — and to secretly cross our fingers for a record-breaking, 1,700-horsepower Polestar.

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