If the Microlino looks familiar, that’s no coincidence. The electric city car was designed to look like the classic Isetta and the company has been teasing their modern reincarnation for a while.
To start 2021, Microlino has completed its latest prototype and the company is setting out its timeline for the coming months that will see production start before the year is out.
The car you see driving around in these pictures is a closer-to-production tester called the prototype 2.0. It has swapped out prototype 1.0’s tubular frame for a stiffer and safer -but no heavier- pressed-steel frame, as you can see in pictures.
Although it’s still missing a few key details, like an LED light bar at the front, this is more like what the structure of the production car will look like. In all, the company hopes to make five of these prototypes. They hope to finish about one a month, with each improving on the last.
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Meanwhile, Microlino will also start preparing tooling so that it’s ready to produce vehicles as soon as possible. In June, the company will look to homologate its car in Europe, a process it expects to take two to three months.
And as soon as Microlino gets its homologation papers, it aims to start production. If you’re following along at home, that should all mean that production will finally begin in September 2021.
Set to start at around €12,000 (about $14,500 USD) the little electric runabout will get up to about 200 km (125 miles) of range. Its price point makes it more expensive than a Renault Twizy (€7,350) but less expensive than a Smart EQ (€22,000).