Geely licenses electric platform to Polish carmaker EMP

Geely has signed an agreement to license its all-electric Sustainable Experience Architecture (SEA) to ElectroMobility Poland (EMP), a budding electric vehicle manufacturer backed by the Polish government.

EMP plans to develop several electric models for its Izera brand. Two show cars were unveiled in July 2020. Already at that time, it was said that the vehicles (an SUV and a compact car) would be based on a bought-in electric car platform without revealing which platform the makers had in mind.

Polish media then speculated that this would fall to Volkswagen with the MEB platform, Toyota with the e-TNGA or Hyundai with the new E-GMP. Geely could not have been on the radar then: The Chinese company only presented the SEA at the end of September 2020, around two months after the Izera prototypes. The Smart #1, for example, is also based on the SEA. Whether the key data with the 66 kWh battery and the 200 kW drive can be transferred to the Izera remains to be seen.

The declared goal of the project was to develop an electric car that uses components from Polish suppliers as much as possible. EMP has only secured the licence to build vehicles based on the SEA but not buy platform components. This means that EMP could manufacture the components itself with Polish suppliers, using only Geely’s patents and design plans.

According to Geely, the first Izera model that will use the Geely platform is to be a compact SUV. It is still unclear at this stage whether the vehicle will be close to the study shown in 2020. After the SUV, Izera has plans for a compact car and a station wagon. As reported, the electric cars will be produced in a new plant in Jaworzno from 2024.

So far, only electric carmakers with Geely participation have used the SEA. This makes EMP the first third-party customer. “Geely Holding is proud to sign this agreement to license its industry-leading SEA architecture to EMP,” says Daniel Donghui Li, CEO of Geely Holding Group. “Our SEA architecture will help EMP to bring the best products to market for end users in terms of hardware, software and scalability.”

“SEA architecture perfectly fits the Izera product concept. Geely is providing EMP with the highest-class of industry know-how as well as additional business opportunities,” says Piotr Zaremba, CEO of ElectroMobility Poland. “In the long run, this technology partnership will allow EMP to thrive, allowing us to heavily engage local suppliers and execute the project within the envisaged business framework.”