Lamborghini stares at Ferrari Luce — and quietly pulls the plug on its first EV

Lamborghini drops the all-electric Lanzador and turns it into a PHEV. Winkelmann explains why a pure EV doesn't fit the brand's clients while Ferrari pushes ahead with the Luce.

Lamborghini is not killing the Lanzador, but it is sharply rewriting what it stands for. The car everyone expected to become the brand's first series-production EV is now set to arrive as a plug-in hybrid — Lamborghini buyers are simply not ready to give up the combustion engine.

CEO Stephan Winkelmann laid out the logic in plain terms. The company could build a very powerful and very fast electric car, but Lamborghini's job is not to demonstrate what is technically possible — it is to deliver what its customers actually want. In his words, those customers still want an internal combustion engine, while a PHEV gives them more power and helps cut CO2 at the same time. Fully electric models have been pushed back indefinitely.

The Lanzador was originally conceived as a three-door, four-seat grand tourer with crossover overtones. Under the new plan it becomes the link between the Temerario and Revuelto supercars and the Urus SUV. That was confirmed by Stefano Cossalter, the executive in charge of the Lanzador and Urus product lines. In Lamborghini's range, the silhouettes are now meant to line up like this: Temerario, Revuelto, Lanzador and Urus.

Technically, the switch from EV to PHEV almost certainly means walking away from the pure-electric SSP platform. The more logical route is for the Lanzador to share its bones with the Urus. That cuts the risk: the buyer still gets an electric layer for city driving and instant response, but does not lose the familiar engine, the soundtrack or the range.

The decision also reshapes the next Urus. The second generation of the SUV had been expected to go fully electric by the end of the decade, but Lamborghini is no longer in a hurry. Winkelmann believes that pouring serious money into pure EVs while the market and the customers are not ready would be an expensive hobby and a piece of financial irresponsibility.

Set against Ferrari's Luce, Lamborghini's stance looks the more cautious of the two. Ferrari has already taken the electric step; Lamborghini is choosing a hybrid bridge instead. And for this particular brand, that bridge looks safer for now: its customers are not just paying for speed, they are paying for the mechanical theatre that a battery alone still cannot deliver.