Another crossover may appear in the Buick lineup

It is possible that it will be given the name Electra, which is already familiar in concept: the company has filed an application for registration of the corresponding trademark in Canada.

Buick is an American brand owned by General Motors. In the domestic market, the brand is not doing very well: in recent years, car sales have declined or showed a symbolic increase. The most notable drop was in Covid 2020: Americans bought 162,741 cars, down 21.3% from a year earlier. The figure is up this year, according to Carsalesbase, with dealers selling 151,010 units in the first three quarters (no more recent data available), up 27.4% from January-September 2020.

Pictured: Buick Electra Concept

The current model range of the brand in the US consists of crossovers: Encore, Envision and Enclave are listed on the official website of the brand. So far, Buick does not have a single all-electric vehicle in the United States. However, it is possible that another novelty will correct the situation: it is expected that the model range of the brand will be replenished with a “green” SUV, which will probably be called Electra.

As it became known, the American car manufacturer has filed an application for registration of the Electra trademark in Canada. Information about the document dated December 20 this year appeared on the Rivian owners forum. Note that the presence of the brand does not oblige Buick to use the registered name for the production car, although the hypothesis sounds very plausible.

The name Electra will seem familiar to many: a model with this name was part of the Buick lineup in the last century – this was the name of a car produced from 1959 to 1990 in sedan, coupe, convertible and wagon bodies. This model, of course, was not an electric car: it was named after the sculptor Elektra Wagoner-Biggs. In 1991, this car was replaced by the Buick Park Avenue.

In addition, this name was worn by the Buick Electra concept SUV, presented by the company in the fall of 2020. The show car was distinguished by a high “waist”, large wheel arches and “rollers”, as well as a dark body kit around the perimeter of the body. The head optics and taillights of the show car have a narrow L-shape, and the plug is located in place of the traditional grille. The concept has four side doors: their design is “butterfly wings”, which means that the rear doors open against the direction of travel, and all four rise to the side (diagonally).

Recall that the Buick Electra concept is based on the Ultium platform developed by GM (the already presented serial “electric marketer” Cadillac Lyric is also based on it). The show car received a twin-engine installation (an electric motor for each axle), the total power of which is 589 hp. The declared maximum power reserve on a single charge of this crossover was 660 km.

If Buick decides to build a production car based on the Electra concept, it will likely compete with the Chrysler Airflow (model not yet shown) and Ford Mustang Mach-E (US sales began earlier this year). If the model ends up in the more expensive segment, it will most likely have to compete for buyers with the BMW iX, Audi e-tron and Mercedes-Benz EQE.