Fiat-Chrysler is readying their Melfi plant in Italy to accommodate the making of the Jeep Renegade plug-in hybrid. They scheduled pre-production to start next year, about a year ahead of the market launch in 2020. It is also the beginning of FCA’s wider e-offensive.

　　The Jeep Renegade PHEV features a hybrid motor that cost Fiat-Chrysler 200 million euros to develop. It is also the start of their electrification effort that will see them issue ten plug-in hybrid models and four all-electric cars by 2022 under the Jeep label alone.

　　The pre-production units of the new Jeep Renegade PHEV are scheduled in 2019. The investment for the new system also includes training for all workers and a modernisation of the plant in Melfi.

　　The Renegade PHEV is the next step in FCA’s electrification, following the PHEV Pacifica minivan which Google uses en masse in their autonomous Waymo service. FCA also launched the mild-hybrid e-Torque technology on the Ram 1500 truck earlier this year. By 2022, FCA will offer a total of 12 electric propulsion systems (BEV, PHEV, full-hybrid and mild-hybrid) in global architectures. Thirty different models will be equipped with one or more of these systems across all brands.