SF Motors becomes Seres, launches production SF5 sleek 684HP electric crossover with 300 miles of range

SF Motors, a well-funded electric vehicle startup, is launching its brand as ‘Seres’ and unveiling the production version of the SF5, a sleek electric crossover with 300 miles of range.

We have been extensively covering SF Motors over the past few years as they are positioning themselves to quickly become a big player in the electric vehicle market.

They are backed by China’s Sokon and they already have two production facilities, one in the US and one in China, as well as EV technologies from respected pioneers.

They have acquired AM General’s South Bend, Indiana assembly plant, where they used to produce the commercial Hummer, and they bought the electric powertrain startup founded by Martin Eberhard, Tesla co-founder.

A few months later, they unveiled their first two all-electric vehicles that they plan to bring to production in Indiana, as well as in China.

Now SF Motors is launching a consumer brand, Seres, and unveiling the production version of the SF5, announcing alongside that they will be opening pre-orders in China for deliveries in Q3 2019 during the Shanghai Auto Show.

The production version shows a more market-ready sleek design than what they unveiled last year.

As for the specs, Seres is promising a range of 300 miles on a 90 kWh battery pack.

The company also released a few other specs:

• Maximum Power: 510kw
• Torque: 1040Nm
• Zero to 60: 3.5s
• Top Speed: 250km/h

They have also announced a new range extender version with a smaller 33 kWh battery pack and small engine:

• Maximum Power: 510kw
• Torque: 1040Nm
• Zero to 60: 4.8s
• Top Speed: 230km/h

Both versions of the vehicle are equipped with the following features:

• Center console with 17-inch multimedia touch screen featuring Ali OS 2.0
• 64 in-car environment lights to choose from
• More than 30 active and passive safety configurations
• OBC and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) charging system
• Lightweight aluminum chassis designed for electric performance

They will be announcing the price when they open pre-orders at the Shanghai Auto Show next week.

Electrek’s Take

I am pretty excited for SF Motors, now Seres. It’s not vaporware like many other EV startups. They have two important manufacturing faciltiies and plan to release the vehicles globally.

It’s starting at their Jinkang SERES Intelligent Factory in China:

They claim that the facility has an annual capacity of 150,000 vehicles.

Production is expected to start later at the Indiana facility, which they claim has a capacity of 50,000 vehicles per year.

As for the vehicle, I really like the design of the SF5 and the specs look solid if real. We would need to test the vehicle and learn more about the powertrain, but it looks promising.

I don’t think the range-extender version was necessary. If you make the all-electric version as good as it can be, the range-extender is irrelevant in my opinion.

Of course, we still need to see the pricing details.