The increasing trend of the hybrid car boom, we sat down with Bloomberg Pursuits writer and

car critic Hannah Elliott. Hannah, I thought hybrids were kind of passe until I went to

this New York car show with Matt Miller, and he was showing me around and showing

me how many of these high performance supercars are now some form of hybrid. And, apparently,

14% of the new cars sold in The US last year are hybrids. What is going

on here? Why are they still so popular?

That's exactly right. And I think to your point, a lot of us thought that. A

lot of us thought hybrids were going to be this bridge between combustion engines and EVs,

and they would just be a Band Aid that we rip off, and then we're all

in this glorious future of beautiful electric cars driving us around everywhere. And that actually hasn't

panned out. In fact, like you said, last year, 14% of new cars sold in The

US were hybrids, which was about double the amount of EVs sold. Now, eventually, we probably

will still go to EVs if you listen to analysts and executives and policymakers. But right

now, we're seeing that while EVs are accepted sort of as commodities for mobility, the higher

you get into status symbol and performance type cars, the more buyers are really trying to

hold on to their combustion engines, and the hybrid ends up being a way for them

to do that. And that really speaks to some of those hypercars you saw at the

car show and also this new Audi supercar that is also a hybrid.

Well, Hannah, my introduction to hybrids was my mom's 2014

Nice.

Toyota Prius. Nice. Very efficient. Very sexy. Know, gets the job done the opposite of the

new Vilari. 987 horsepower, v eight engine, three electric motors. Why is the hybrid in the

ultra luxury car category opposite of the Toyota Prius having a moment relative to the electric

vehicle?

It's a very good question, and I think we should say in the car that Audi

is making this supercar, the hybrid is not really about efficiency, which is the opposite of

the Prius. The Prius is all about efficiency. Here, the hybrid helps with driving under slow

speeds. It helps with instant torque. Of course, you wanna go really fast in a supercar,

so it's instant torque. And there is a very short, range of electric only driving that

you can use, like, if you're leaving your neighborhood early in the morning or coming in

late at night and you wanna be very quiet, you can use the hybrid that way.

But, really, it's perform it's to help the performance of the car, not to help the

efficiency of the car, and that's a big change that we're seeing in some of these

high end cars.

What is the internal combustion hangover? Is it just that car guys want to be able

to have that as part of their engine still? Is it are we at the point

where EVs performance wise could do it without the combustion engine in them, without the gas

power, or are we still at a point where the combination is the best performance?

That's a really good question. And EVs are extremely fast. And a a grocery getter EV

can beat the fastest Ferrari or Lamborghini almost to the point where the speed doesn't matter

anymore. And getting back to the first part of your question, it's about the emotion. It's

about there's something that humans are connecting with in the vibration, the sound, the feel of

internal combustion. Yes. It's car guys, but there's there I think, honestly, I think it goes

a little bit deeper than that. There's something about people are they feel safer, more confident.

There's no range anxiety. If you have a hybrid, yes, you can use the electric, but

you still have the combustion, which feels a little more confidence inspiring. There there's just something

that's still a little bit more relatable and tangible and engaging with a vehicle that still

has a combustion engine. I do think consumers will continue to choose EVs, but they don't

really have to right now. And this goes back to this Audi new Volari, which is

$700,000, which really is interesting because Audi obviously believes the consumers that can afford to buy

whatever they want actually do still want some type of combustion in their in their car.

So this is really interesting. I don't think it's gonna change anytime soon. In fact, we're

seeing more and more hybrids from Lamborghini, Ferrari, Bugatti, Porsche, they're coming, and they're here.

Well, Hannah, just quickly here, when we're talking about the kind of collector's items, cars, does

it matter though the efficiency of an EV? I know you were mentioning that, but, like,

if I'm just driving this for a quick lap around the neighborhood to show it off,

why do I care about the ability to not have to worry about charging a car?

You don't. You you you really don't. I mean, that that's that's the other thing too.

I think, you know, Audi shares this platform, this hybrid platform with Lamborghini. There there's a

Lamborghini Temerario, which is the same hybrid platform as this Audi. And, obviously, the automakers have

this technology. They need to use it. It helps with their goals for reducing emissions across

their fleets. So there is a side of this too where automakers are trying to it's

like working in the vegetables with, you know, the other good stuff that we wanna eat.

The automakers need to work this technology into the fleet, but they know consumers won't accept

a pure EV. So this is a way they can use the technology, reduce some emissions,

some, and and really have a best of both worlds scenario. But to your point, you

don't care about range when you're driving around your neighborhood. You care about showing off in

your supercar, and there's nothing wrong with that.