What's the news?
Swedish car maker, Volvo, has completed the entire acquisition of Polestar, a high performance tuning company, which it has had a close partnership with since 1996 and has created some highly tuned versions of Volvo's current model range.
Production numbers remain limited though, the firm currently sells approximately 750 cars annually but this figure is expected to rise under the ownership of Volvo, which will be keen to capitalise on its investment.
With Volvo continuing its move further towards the premium end of the market with new vehicles such as the XC90, there is a growing demand for the company to offer customers a more performance-orientated product that is seen as coming from in-house rather than a separate third party. This is already the case with brands such as Audi and BMW, two firms that Volvo is now edging towards.
Both Polestar and Volvo have agreed to keep the financial details a secret, and although Polestar employees will now become Volvo employees, there is no indication of any potential job losses under the acquisition. On the contrary, it is likely that Volvo will invest further in Polestar to enable an increase in production to around 1,500 cars per annum.
Anything else?
The Polestar racing team will remain in the ownership of Christian Dahl, the former owner of Polestar, and will be renamed as part of the deal although it will reportedly continue to work closely with the Polestar brand.