Renault Australia is open to reintroduction alpine performance brand locally, but says current demand for premium electric sports cars is not strong enough to justify an imminent relaunch.
The historic French sports car brand, which has existed since the 1950s, was revived by Renault in 2017 and launched in Australia the following year. Only the A110 coupe was used worldwide until 2024 (from 2018 to 2021 in Australia), when the company introduced the A290 electric hot hatch based on the Renault 5 E-Tech.
That was the first electric vehicle (EV) to hit the market as part of Alpine’s ambitious global expansion plans, and while it was quickly followed by the A390 electric SUV, the brand recently announced it would be discontinuing all of its larger electric SUVs and modifying its next-generation A110 electric coupe to potentially include a gasoline version.
Still, Renault Australia general manager Glen Sealey says he is “very excited about Alpine.”
“If we look at Alpine with a fully electric range, we believe there is an opportunity,” he told media at the local launch of the Renault Scenic E-Tech.
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“But when I look at sales above the (luxury car tax) rate in the Australian all-electric car market, they are not fantastic. So now is not the time to launch.”
This is despite Mr Sealey announcing “the return of the iconic Alpine performance brand to Australia” in May 2025, with the three-engine A390 previously set to lead the brand’s revival locally in late 2026 or early 2027.
But the change in tone reflects Mr Sealey’s sentiment towards future Renault electric vehicles, where he says Australia’s electric market share is currently too small to justify more than three electric vehicles from the French brand, although there are several new models on sale in Europe.
“It goes back to Renault 4 and Renault 5. We need to look at the market, assess the market where it is, make sure it meets those three criteria and once it does that we need to get going. But the cupboard is there to get something out of it,” Mr Sealey said.
According to Mr Sealey, this criterion is about whether a car works for the manufacturer from a profit perspective, fits into the brand’s dealer network and makes sense for customers. At the moment it looks like the business case for Alpine isn’t working out the way Renault Australia needs it to.
Asked whether this means Alpine’s previously planned late 2026/early 2027 launch has been delayed, Mr Sealey said Renault needed to “evaluate the market for a bit longer first”.
“We still have the opportunity. If you look at Alpine, the next thing you see is the A390, which has just been launched in Europe, a great vehicle,” he said.
“But would we launch this today when the segment is so little above the LCT threshold for electric vehicles? Not yet.”
The current LCT threshold for fuel efficient vehicles (vehicles with a combined fuel consumption of less than 3.5L/100km) is $91,387, and vehicles priced above this threshold will incur additional costs.
Alpine’s A390 starts at 67,500 euros, or about A$110,000, in France, well above the Australian direct conversion LCT limit. To put this into perspective, there are currently 76 individual model variants for sale priced above the threshold, compared to 173 below, and it is the latter group that dominates EV volume.
Renault Australia is currently unable to provide a new estimate for Alpine’s local re-launch, with Mr Sealey stating that the French sports car brand’s relaunch “depends on the market”.
With the SUVs Renault planned to place above the A390 now axed, it is believed the brand will instead focus on developing derivatives based on the A110, with the possibility of different seating arrangements and powertrains as part of the new-generation model range due to launch later this year.
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