Audi is giving a healthy discount for its demo premium electric SUV
The impressive Audi Setia Alam showroom has become a landmark in the bustling Setia Alam area and this showroom is now offering a healthy discount for their Audi demo units.
This advert was shared with us by a reader who wanted to know if this discount had anything to do with the current EV price war happening between the Chinese electric car brands in Malaysia.
Well, when there is an EV price war in the ‘below RM199k’ price segment, there should not be another price war in a premium segment.
But with EV sales moving slower than expected and the European premium brands offering great ‘quiet’ discounts to move metal, it is no surprise that this is happening.
Interestingly, it should be noted that this is an Audi showroom demo unit as the advert clearly states and with 4k plus kilometers already used, so as a used premium EV, the asking price of RM400,000 is about right and would be ‘snapped’ up very quickly by a premium EV buyer.
This Audi SQ8 e-tron was launched earlier this year and has state-of-the-art cabin technology and powertrain.
Meanwhile it is fact that the EV charging infrastructure providers have been slow to deploy charging facilities outside of Klang Valley and the many promises over the past 12 months have NOT been met. Now while it is certainly admirable for the current government administration to be pushing hard towards an EV future for Malaysia, it probably was to be expected even back then that its ambitions might be a little to difficult to transform into a tangible reality.
Hence why there is perhaps currently (and rather quietly) a few reassessment of its goals, with the most notable of which being the recent possibility of a review on MITI’s previously laid out target for there to be 10,000 chargers nationwide by 2025.
This in turn has somewhat reduced the EV purchase demand in Malaysia a little as buyers want to see more charging points outside of Klang Valley to make interstate travel much easier.
Gentari in September 2022 announced that they were looking to have 25,000 public charging points in Asia Pacific, including Malaysia. Gentari targeted to deploy 400 charges in 2023 to support the government’s plan of having 10,000 charging points by 2025. The company deployed 170 charging points in 2023, with another 230 to be deployed in the remainder of this year to achieve its target.
So far in Malaysia, they have only deployed over 335 EV charging points with over 100 DC fast chargers nationwide.
Gentari proudly operates the largest DC charging network aimed at enhancing accessibility to low carbon transportation options across the country.
