IM Motors IM6 review: When software creates a Porsche rival

[SINGAPORE] Of all the EVs I’ve driven, the Audi e-tron GT, BMW i4, Porsche Taycan and Tesla Model 3 served up the most driving pleasure – and the IM6 Performance now joins that list. It’s fast and feels properly sorted, the kind of car that makes you take the long way home, as young people say, for the feels.

Yes, I just put a Chinese sport utility vehicle from a carmaker that, let’s be honest, you’ve never heard of, in the same company as Porsche. I guess nothing from China should surprise us any more.

For a quick primer, IM Motors is a joint venture between heavyweights who each bring something to the table. SAIC Motor, China’s biggest car company, does the hardware, while Alibaba supplies the digital brains. For a curveball, Zhangjiang Hi-Tech, a state-backed technology investment group that runs a science park often called China’s Silicon Valley, also owns a slice.

If IM Motors is new to you, its dealer is not. Eurokars Group opened the brand’s Leng Kee Road showroom on Oct 9, and having cultivated several legacy names here, the country’s biggest privately held dealership now intends to do the same with IM.

The titanic threesome has certainly created a thought-provoking car, in the form of a five-seat, coupe-style SUV with dual motors delivering an epic 778 horsepower and 802 Newton-metres of torque – numbers you’d expect from Modena rather than Shanghai. It’s a little longer than a Tesla Model Y, and just a smidgen wider.

A 100 kilowatt-hour battery delivers 505 km of range and charges from 10 to 80 per cent in 18 minutes, thanks to 800-volt architecture.

But beneath the streamlined bodywork, the IM6 isn’t so much engineered as it is programmed. It has what IM calls a “digital chassis”, which ties the rolling hardware into one high-speed nervous system.

There are single motor versions of the IM6 (including one tuned for the cheaper Category A Certificate of Entitlement), but the range-topping Performance variant adds air springs to a double-wishbone/multi-link suspension setup. With the central computer constantly orchestrating the suspension, the brakes and the four-wheel steering system, the IM6 feels less like a 2.4-tonne hippo and more like a wheeled ballerina.

Press on, and the IM6 drops lower to the ground for stability, while the active suspension cancels out body rolls through fast corners. The steering becomes meaty, and though the motors’ massive torque makes the tyres chirp, there’s breathtaking traction and spectacular acceleration.

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During the morning commute, the car becomes pillowy and refined, switching personalities to become a quiet luxury barge. The air springs flatten tarmac with that slow-motion rebound you normally associate with expensive limousines, and the motors spin up more gently. What’s impressive is that the car responds to various situations in a way that makes you forget how much tech is at work. Instead, the IM6 simply feels sorted, in the way great cars always do.

In that sense, the IM is an early example of what the industry calls a software-defined vehicle – one where the car’s behaviour, features and user experience are driven more by lines of code than by mechanical hardware. Think of it as the difference between a traditional watch and a smartwatch – hardware provides the foundation, but software unlocks capabilities that can evolve and improve over time.

This new approach to designing cars does invite you to re-examine old ideas. IM thinks the rearview mirror is so redundant that the IM6’s can be folded away, for example. Instead, you can call up a camera feed on the enormous, sharp 26.3-inch main screen for a quick peek behind you.

And then there’s Crab Mode, which lets the car scuttle sideways like a polite crustacean. I can’t see how that would be useful, but here’s something that is: the four-wheel steering lets the IM6 pull tighter U-turns than a Mini Cooper, believe it or not.

While driving the IM6 is a treat, there are quirks. Nearly all the controls live on a 10.5-inch screen mounted low, obliging you to take your eye off the road. Using it smoothly also means hunting through menus and remembering which screen has what. Any new features have to be downloaded during servicing because, surprisingly, over-the-air updates aren’t supported.

The glass roof has no sunshade (though it seems to block heat better than most), while the boot seems smaller than its 646-litre capacity, and lacks hooks or nets for keeping things tidy.

But those quibbles fade when you’re threading the IM6 through a series of bends, marvelling at how a car this heavy can feel this agile, or when you’re gliding along in supreme comfort. IM may be a new brand, but if it keeps producing cars like this it could leave other names in its rearview camera display.

IM Motors IM6 EV Performance AWD

Motor Power/Torque 778 hp/802 Nm

Battery Type/Net Capacity Lithium Nickel Manganese Cobalt/100 kWh

Charging Time/Type 11.5 hours (11 kW AC), 18 minutes 10 to 80 per cent (396 kW DC)

Range 505 km (WLTP)

0-100 kmh 3.48 seconds

Top Speed 239 kmh

Efficiency 23.4 kWh/100 km

Agent Eurokars EV

Price S$354,888 with COE

Available Now