Tag Archives: Bentley

NEW CARS

Bentley Doubles Down on EVs While Rivals Hedge Their Bets

Bentley is not hedging its bets. While rivals scramble to retrofit their electric ambitions with a safety net of combustion, Crewe is doubling down—quietly, confidently, and perhaps a little defiantly.

At a time when Lotus Cars has pivoted midstream—reengineering its Lotus Eletre X to accommodate a range-extending combustion setup amid cooling demand—Bentley Motors is choosing a different path. Its forthcoming “Luxury Urban EV,” set to debut in the second half of this year, will remain exactly what it was always meant to be: fully electric, no backup plan required.

CEO Frank-Steffen Walliser doesn’t sound like a man interested in engineering compromises. Retrofitting an internal combustion engine—or even a plug-in hybrid system—into Bentley’s new EV platform isn’t just off the table; it’s fundamentally incompatible. The PPE architecture underpinning the car simply wasn’t designed for such duality. And more to the point, Bentley doesn’t want it to be.

That’s a notable stance in a segment that’s showing early signs of hesitation. Premium EV adoption hasn’t exactly stalled, but it has lost some of its initial inevitability. Walliser himself admits that one of the key challenges ahead lies in figuring out just how large the market really is—and who, exactly, is ready to spend six figures on silent propulsion.

Bentley’s answer isn’t to dilute the product. Instead, it’s to diversify the showroom. The plug-in hybrid Bentley Bentayga remains in play as the brand’s bridge to combustion loyalists, ensuring that the new EV doesn’t have to be all things to all buyers. “We’re not here to force anyone,” Walliser effectively says. Translation: if you’re not ready for electric, Bentley still has something for you. If you are, they’re building something entirely new.

And that’s the interesting bit. Bentley insists this isn’t a replacement, but an expansion—a strategic reach toward a different kind of customer. Which raises the question: what exactly is a Bentley EV supposed to be?

Clues are thin, but not nonexistent. The new model will share key underpinnings with the upcoming Porsche Cayenne Electric, suggesting serious hardware. Think dual motors, all-wheel drive, and outputs that could climb into four-digit horsepower territory. If Porsche’s numbers hold—up to 1140 hp and nearly 400 miles of range from a 113 kWh battery—Bentley’s version won’t be lacking in muscle or stamina.

But performance alone doesn’t define a Bentley. According to Matthias Rabe, the goal is something more nuanced: “very comfortable like a Flying Spur and agile like a Continental GT.” That’s a tall order—melding limousine ride quality with grand-tourer sharpness—but if achieved, it could mark a new kind of flagship. Not just electric, but distinctly Bentley.

Rabe goes further, promising blistering acceleration figures and, perhaps most boldly, calling it “the best Bentley on the road.” That’s either marketing bravado or a sign that Crewe sees this car as more than a compliance exercise.

So while others hedge, Bentley commits. No hybrids, no range extenders, no safety nets. Just a clean-sheet EV aimed at buyers who don’t need convincing—or at least, don’t want compromise.

In a market still figuring itself out, that kind of clarity might be the biggest luxury of all.

Source: Bentley

News

Even Bentley’s Cargo Jets Are Going Green Now

Bentley has never been shy about excess. Twelve cylinders, mirror-finish walnut, enough cowhide to upholster a gentlemen’s club. But in 2026, excess comes with an asterisk—and a carbon calculation. So while the brand from Bentley Motors is still perfectly happy to airfreight your six-figure grand tourer across continents at a moment’s notice, it now plans to do so on something a little less Jurassic than conventional jet fuel.

The company announced it will use Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) for all customer car airfreight movements worldwide, effective immediately. It’s a headline that sounds bureaucratic until you remember what’s actually happening: when a customer in, say, Dubai or Los Angeles needs their Continental or Bentayga delivered yesterday, that car often boards a cargo jet. And cargo jets, as physics relentlessly reminds us, burn a lot of fuel.

Bentley insists airfreight remains the exception, not the rule. Sea freight is still the default, because container ships sip fuel compared with aircraft guzzling it at 35,000 feet. But in the rare cases when time zones and client expectations collide, the brand says those flights will now run on ISCC-certified SAF—an alternative fuel derived from renewable or waste-based sources that can be pumped into existing aircraft without modification. No new engines. No sci-fi hardware. Just a different cocktail in the tank.

The important bit isn’t that it works—it does—but that it meaningfully cuts lifecycle emissions. Depending on feedstock and production method, SAF can reduce lifecycle CO₂e emissions by up to 70 to 95 percent compared with conventional jet fuel. That’s not greenwashing math; it’s independently verified well-to-wheel accounting, the kind sustainability departments love and engineers respect.

According to Aimee Kelly, Bentley’s Head of Sustainability, the shift reflects “measurable, evidence-based steps” to reduce emissions where flying remains unavoidable. Translation: if you must ship a two-and-a-half-ton luxury coupe by air, at least make the jet fuel count for something.

Bentley says it has already transported customer cars using SAF, recording substantial CO₂e reductions compared with traditional aviation fuel. At present, the coverage applies to all customer car airfreight movements, and the company is exploring whether SAF can be expanded across additional logistics routes that require air transport.

This isn’t an isolated PR flourish. It slots into Bentley’s broader Beyond100+ strategy—its long-term roadmap to transform the company into a leader in sustainable luxury mobility. Beyond100+ aims to decarbonize operations and the value chain while preserving what Bentley considers non-negotiable: craftsmanship, performance, and the sort of quiet authority that comes from building cars in Crewe for over a century.

If this sounds like a strange juxtaposition—private jets and planet-saving ambitions—you’re not wrong. Luxury and sustainability have historically been uneasy roommates. But the modern ultra-luxury customer expects both: speed and conscience, indulgence and accountability.

There’s also a pragmatic undertone here. Airfreight produces significantly higher emissions than sea transport. That’s a hard truth. So rather than pretending urgency doesn’t exist in global markets, Bentley is targeting the emissions intensity of the flight itself. It’s a surgical move: decarbonize the outliers while continuing to lean on lower-impact shipping where possible.

For a brand built on W-12 engines and two-tone paintwork, this is a different kind of engineering challenge. Not horsepower per liter, but carbon per kilometer. Not 0–60 times, but well-to-wheel emissions curves.

Will Sustainable Aviation Fuel single-handedly absolve the environmental footprint of shipping a 5000-pound luxury car by air? Of course not. But in a world where logistics is often the invisible giant in a product’s carbon story, it’s a meaningful lever.

And if Bentley is serious about redefining sustainable luxury, the real work isn’t just in electrifying the lineup—it’s in rethinking everything that happens before the key fob ever lands in a customer’s hand.

Source: Bentley

Auctions

The 1999 Continental SC Is the Rarest Way to Be a Gentleman Racer

Before the Bentley Continental GT became the globe-trotting symbol of nouveau-luxury speed, Bentley was already experimenting with how to make old-money muscle feel modern. One of those experiments—the Continental SC, also known as the Sedanca Coupe—is now resurfacing at auction, and it might be one of the most interesting Bentleys most people have never heard of.

Built in 1999 on the bones of the Continental R, the Continental SC was Bentley’s idea of a high-speed tuxedo with a removable roof. It was part grand tourer, part targa, and entirely unnecessary in the best possible way. Only 73 were built (plus six even rarer Mulliner versions), making this one of the rarest post-Crewe Bentleys ever produced.

And now one of them—barely driven and still looking freshly tailored—is heading to RM Sotheby’s in Miami.

Old-School Bentley, But Make It Sporty

Finished in classic Bentley black, the Continental SC looks exactly how a late-’90s British luxury coupe should: imposing, formal, and just slightly menacing. The upright matrix grille and mesh lower intakes are flanked by red Bentley badges, a subtle nod that this is no ordinary Continental R. The chrome trim is tasteful, not flashy, and the five-spoke 18-inch wheels give the car a planted, muscular stance.

Everything about the exterior says “banker by day, outlaw by night.”

But the real party trick is on the roof.

A Bentley With a Split Personality

The Continental SC is a targa in the most Bentley way possible. Two removable glass panels sit above the front seats, while a fixed glass roof section covers the rear. Whether the panels are installed or stowed away, the cabin remains bright and open—more Riviera than racetrack.

When you want open-air motoring, the glass panels lift out and disappear into a dedicated trunk compartment. To keep the chassis from turning into a luxury noodle, Bentley borrowed structural reinforcements from the Azure convertible, making this part-coupe, part-convertible Frankenstein surprisingly stiff for something weighing well over two tons.

It’s weird. It’s brilliant. And Bentley would never build something like this today.

Wood, Leather, and Late-’90s Excess

Inside, the SC is peak pre-VW Bentley. Heated leather seats with black piping look barely used, and they’re surrounded by acres of burled walnut, cold metal trim, and the sort of craftsmanship that made Rolls-Royce nervous back then.

There’s also an Alpine audio system with a CD changer, which is a reminder that this car was built when people still curated music instead of streaming it. It’s not modern, but it is wonderfully period-correct.

Turbo V8, Because of Course

Under that long, formal hood lives Bentley’s legendary 6.75-liter turbocharged V8. It makes 400 horsepower and a truly absurd 590 lb-ft of torque—numbers that still feel outrageous today. Power flows through a four-speed automatic, because manuals are for peasants, and Bentley had places to be.

The result? 0–60 mph in just over six seconds and a top speed of 155 mph. That might not sound shocking now, but in 1999 this was supercar territory for something with walnut trim and heated seats.

The Price of Rarity

This Canadian-market example is being sold without reserve at RM Sotheby’s Miami auction and is expected to bring between $250,000 and $300,000—roughly what a brand-new Continental GT costs today.

But here’s the difference: a new GT is mass-produced luxury. This is hand-built, absurdly rare, and nearly untouched, with just 4,330 km (2,691 miles) on the clock over 27 years.

You’re not just buying a car. You’re buying a Bentley that Bentley almost forgot.

And in a world of increasingly digital, sanitized luxury, the Continental SC feels like a reminder of when automakers still took wild, wonderful risks—just because they could.

Source: RM Sotheby’s