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Mercedes's Auto 2000 was ahead of its time - we take a look and compare it to its modern electric ancestor.

Here’s the future of the electric car – through the lens of the Mercedes-Benz car company and their speculative view of how executive transport could look wrapped in an EV platform.

It’s the EQXX concept – but Mercedes-Benz also decided to gaze at the future through the medium of the concept car before and nowhere is the link between past and future most evident than between the EQXX and its 41-year-old spiritual predecessor, the Auto 2000 Concept.

We look briefly at the 1981 flagship concept and compare it to the EQXX to see how a design from decades ago is still relevant enough to steer modern design and influences.

In 1980, Mercedes took on a challenge from the Federal German Ministry for Research and Technology to produce a car which was not only fuel efficient but satisfied various requirements along the lines of weight and capability.

With only the pre-80s as automotive experience, Mercedes-Benz, along with Volkswagen and Audi had to find a way to build a car no more than 4700 lbs in weight, consume no more than around 21 MPG and have a payload capacity of 400 kg and up to four people inside.

Nowadays, we have cars that can do all that and weigh far less while consuming far less, but at the start of the 80s we lacked a lot of the technology we have now, especially fuel efficiency-related know-how.

Mercedes-Benz has always been at the forefront of automotive design since the beginning when it released its Benz Patent-Motorwagen with a 1-liter, two-cylinder gasoline engine with 2/3 of a single horsepower. They set to work on this new project for completion before the 1981 Frankfurt Motor Show.

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At the heart of the idea were two main strategies for increasing fuel economy against all the odds – the external body design and the engine.

Starting outside, the whole thing vaguely resembles a Mercedes-Benz sedan from the 80s, with the lights and features looking like Mercedes-Benz designs of the period like the C126 S-Class Coupe.

Looking closer though there are many differences and futuristic features present on the Auto 2000, starting with the clean, slanted front end that would go on to inspire later cars, the laterally opening hood and the rear design which is the most futuristic piece of design on the exterior.

Seemingly taking inspiration from futuristic cars like the DMC DeLorean and speculating how the year 2000 might look for the automotive industry, the Auto 2000 has a wraparound glasshouse, curving down to its vertical rear end, a ‘Kamm’ tail, like the rear end on a first-generation Honda Insight.

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Under the hood of this low-slung, shiny silver executive car was the key to accomplishing the goal of efficiency. There were 3 engines proposed, including a 3.8-liter V8 with cylinder deactivation – a feature that today gets employed in a variety of cars, a gas turbine and a diesel engine.

A four-speed automatic gearbox was to handle cog swapping duties.

The gas turbine was lightweight, but the diesel was the clear winner here, the 3.3-liter V6 turbo diesel capable of 150 hp, a lot of torque and 534 miles on a tank of fuel.

With a drag coefficient of 0.28, it was slippery enough to obtain more than 31 MPG, which was good for a few reasons.

Considering the weight of the car, the relatively primitive engine technology of the time and the size of the unit, the fuel figure was more than reasonable.

In this way, the newly revealed for this year EQXX concept from Mercedes-Benz is looking back while looking forward, with its past accolades and experience shaping its current efforts.

This car, revealed at CES in 2022, is a long, 4-door executive coupe, similar in theory to the Auto 2000 Concept which came out 4 decades before.

This time, it’s much more rounded but manages to look extremely elegant due to the sleek front and lights, the raked coupe roof and the returning Kamm-tail rear end looking like a McLaren Speedtail.

Now, the latest showcase for technology and efficiency from Mercedes-Benz looks closer than ever to reality.

Driven in two long trips across Europe, the car managed 747 miles on a single charge of its 100 kWh battery, with a coefficient of 0.17, lower still than its spiritual predecessor, the Auto 2000.

It can even accelerate to 60 mph in around 7 seconds, prompting us to think that this could be one of the best all-round cars ever, and hopefully a realistic representation of what’s to come soon from the Mercedes-Benz portfolio.

Hailing from Britain, the home of both MG and Aston Martin, Dave is no stranger to sports cars. Or a little rain. When he's not busy working his day-job or writing songs and pretending to be a musician; Dave indulges his obsession with cars by writing and researching diligently, so that he can inform and convert other people to the dark side.