Jaguar unveils its all-electric race car ‘I-TYPE’ for the Formula E, Panasonic joins the team

We caught a glimpse of it in our post earlier this week about the sounds of the new Formula E race cars, but today Jaguar officially unveils its all-electric ‘I-TYPE’ that will compete in the championship in partnership with battery maker Panasonic.

Panasonic, best known in the EV industry for supplying battery cells to Tesla, announced that it joined Jaguar in the all-electric racing championship to create the “Panasonic Jaguar Racing” team.

Adam Carroll and Mitch Evans will be the team’s drivers and Ho-Pin Tung will serve as a reserve driver.

The team and vehicle will debut in their first race in just a few weeks when the season 3 of the Formula E starts on October 9, 2016 in Hong Kong.

The new ‘I-TYPE’ will serve as a test bed for Jaguar’s upcoming electric vehicle technology. Since last year, rumours have been going around that Jaguar plans to release an all-electric SUV as soon as in 2017.

Last month, an all-electric prototype featuring a camouflaged F-Pace exterior was spotted in the wild.

While we wait for Jaguar’s official plans for bringing electric vehicles to market, it’s encouraging to see that the automaker’s comeback to racing is done through the Formula E’s all-electric Championship.

Here’s a gallery of the new ‘I-TYPE’ and a video further down: