Elisabeth Behrmann

When Karl Benz built the first gasoline-powered automobile in 1885, it looked like a horse-drawn carriage without the horses. It would take more than three decades for the shape of vehicles to catch up to the new way of propelling them forward. Mercedes-Benz design chief Gorden Wagener says electric motors could similarly reshape the way cars look. “The architecture is going to change fundamentally,” he says.
 
 At the Paris Motor Show on Sept. 29, Wagener unveiled the Generation EQ, an electric sport utility/coupe crossover with a range of roughly 300 miles—part of a lineup Mercedes will market under a new subbrand, EQ. The first model—which Mercedes says will be priced to compete with similar cars with traditional engines—will hit in 2019, and a total of 10 SUVs, sedans, and compacts are planned by 2025.