Mysterious new Rimac is definitely not a hot hatch, sorry

Mate Rimac has taken to Instagram to tease “something very special we’ve been working on for the last [five] years” which will be revealed on 26 June. Any guesses?

The video, which is thumbnailed (is that a word?) with a picture of celebrated French novelist Jules Verne - he of Around the World in 80 Days authorship - shows the outline of something hatchback-shaped and, er, that’s it.

Naturally, the internet has erupted with speculation that Rimac is on the verge of revealing a game-changing hot hatch with the powertrain of a Nevera, but that’s so far wide of the mark that it belongs in the same filing cabinet as the many thousands of recent Kate Middleton conspiracy theories.

Rimac had been expected to reveal the robotaxi that it’s quietly been working on at some point in 2024, and a LinkedIn post from its Project 3 Mobility arm confirms that the thing teased here is part of its “next chapter”. So there you go.

Details have been incredibly hard to come by since the project’s inception, but last year Rimac was granted north of £150 million in EU funding to support development of an autonomous EV. The programme also has backing from Kia, as well as the IT service company Infinum.

P3M claims it is working on ‘a groundbreaking autonomous ecosystem’ that weaves in a mobile app, infrastructure and a vehicle ‘built on a completely new platform designed around safety and comfort’.

Definitely not a hot hatch then. Sorry.