Chrysler surprises automotive industry with three electric vehicles

After announcing the bad news first, a $400 million loss for the year so far, Chrysler followed up with some very surprising good news: three new electric vehicles. And unlike GM, whose Chevy Volt is an uninspiring sedan that appears to have been traced from a silhouette of the Toyota Prius (despite the very exciting concept version the General teased us with), Chrysler has released the iconic Jeep Wrangler and the immensely popular Chrysler Town & Country minivan as range-extended electric vehicles. On top of that, they also released a pure electric convertible built on the Lotus Europa platform that will compete directly with the Tesla Roadster.

It turns out Chrysler has been sandbagging us all along, and has been working on electric vehicles since January 2007. They even went so far as to bring three electric vehicle mockups to the Detroit auto show in January "to show what electric vehicles could look like" and also to appear way behind GM in the electric vehicle race. Leading up to announcements from GM and Chrysler Tesla and Phoenix have dominated the consumer EV arena while hobbyists have continued converting existing cars with aftermarket EV components.