Mercedes has officially announced that its future models won’t see stick transmission.
The giant automakers have been making numerous significant changes to their cars over time. These changes take place with advancements in technology, and one such latest change is announced by the Iconic car manufacturer ‘Mercedes Benz’ on Tuesday.
It is disastrous news for the people who love to shift their car gears manually and are more comfortable that way, especially Europeans who prefer manual over the automatic transmission vehicles at large.
Markus Schafer, the chief of R&D, said that the Mercedes had made this decision of eliminating manual shifter to streamline production and to minimize the costs as much possible.
This process of phasing out the manual transmission was started by Audi when they made the switch, and the stick transmission is an obsolete feature on their latest models. However, the difference between Mercedes and the auto manufacturers who have abandoned production of the manual transmission is that Mercedes announced, others just did it.
Schafer also stated some other changes that the giant auto manufacturer has planned for the future, including reducing the production of combustion engines and substantially streamlined production platforms.
The news is a joy for Americans as they prefer automatic over manual transmission and is opposite in Europe, where most people prefer manual shifting. This will likely increase the demand for manual shifting Benz models that are already available at the dealerships.
A spokesperson from Mercedes Benz said that they have planned to reduce the ICE power train portfolio by forty percent until 2025, and by 2030 it is expected to reduce it by a significant seventy percent, respectively. Mercedes said these changes are being made to shift towards a completely new generation of vehicles.
The German auto manufacturer has been progressing towards developing concepts like an eScooter and producing more and more luxury electric car models to compete with the latest automotive industry trends.
