Skoda wants cheaper cars. Not just EVs, but combustion engines too. The cheap city car is dying in Europe. Petrol models like the Ford Ka, Peugeot 19, and Skoda’s own Citigo are gone. Axed.
Customers who can’t afford superminis are left stranded. Forced upmarket into things like the Skoda Fabia if they want new metal. It’s not a perfect solution for everyone.
Now Skoda is weighing two options. One: enter the electric city car segment. Two: bring the Kylaq, an Indian-market crossover, to Europe.
“We have a project where we’re looking at putting components together from very cost-efficient sources,” Skoda CEO Klaus Zellmer says.
The EV angle started with the Volkswagen ID Every1 concept. It’s supposed to replace the VW Up later this year. Skoda helped build it, then walked away. Zellmer calls it a pragmatic pivot. Battery-elective sales aren’t growing as fast as expected. Margins in that space? Thin. Nearly invisible.
Sticking with the petrol Fabia, Scala, and Kamiq feels safer. They make money. The engineering works. Customers know them. Meanwhile, Volkswagen can fight for that fledgling EV market. Why duplicate effort when it might not pay off?
A new budget EV from Skoda won’t happen this decade. At least not soon. But that leaves a gap. The Fabia starts at £21,047 in the UK. Can we go lower?
Zellmer points to India. The Skoda Kylaq costs £6,000 there. Roughly. It’s shorter than a Fabia. A proper budget weapon. The platform? The MQB A0, which Skoda oversees within the Group. It also underpins the larger Kushaq and Slavia there.
The tech exists. The chassis is shared. The only hurdle is specification. Can you raise the finish to European levels without breaking the price? It’s a business experiment. Squeezing every penny out of the supply chain. If it works, you get a car below £20k that actually carries a Skoda badge.
If you look at the gap between £6,040 and £21,219… is it insurmountable? Probably not.
They’d need to fix the interior materials. Sort out the safety kit. Maybe strip it down a bit more than usual.
But would anyone buy it? The price looks undeniable.
