If this piece of news had arrived in two days time, we would have assumed it was an April Fools Day joke. That’s apparently not the case: Volkswagen intends to rebrand its US-based division as Voltswagen to indicate the company’s commitment to electric vehicles. It would sound utterly ridiculous, if the actual pun wasn’t so enjoyable.

This news does come by way of a leak, so take it with a grain of salt. It seems that someone was a touch overeager in publishing a press release that was intended for 29 April. The actual message was incomplete, so clearly some poor copywriter had all their work exposed for the world to see a little too early. The press release has since been removed but not before CNBC managed to take a gander at it.

Voltswagen charges into battle

CNBC went one step further and reached out to a contact at currently-still-known-as-Volkswagen who confirmed the name change was real. As for a reasoning behind the name change, the car manufacturer wants to indicate to the world that it’s going all-in on electric vehicles. The press releases reportedly described the move as a, “public declaration of the company’s future-forward investment in e-mobility. EV vehicles will have a new, light-blue Voltswagen badge placed on the exterior while traditional petrol/diesel vehicles will simply be branded with “VW”, like a mark of shame.

Soon-to-be-Voltswagen has been making a rather steady push into the EV space lately. Just yesterday the world was reminded of the ID Buzz, a minibus that resembles that iconic and beloved hippie-designed van while being completely electric. While the rebranding seems like an excessive effort to drive home the company’s intentions, it’s still a little cool. We at Stuff always appreciate a good pun.

Source: CNBC