Aston Martin unveils 3 new vehicles, including F1 race car

Luxury car company Aston Martin (AML.L) unveiled three new vehicle models, including an F1 race car, for the upcoming season. Aston Martin is calling this trio its "three new jewels in the crown of high performance."

Yahoo Finance Reporter Pras Subramanian joins the Live show to speak with Aston Martin Chairman Lawrence Stroll about the new unveiling from Aston Martin and how it can impact the company moving forward.

Stroll gives insight into the launch: "We've never had so many launches in one back-to-back period of time in the company's history and that just continues on our success of our DBX, our SUV, which we launched three years ago. We've taken 20% share of the automotive luxury SUV high-performance market, in three years — quite a feat."

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Yahoo Finance Live.

Editor's note: This article was written by Nicholas Jacobino

Video Transcript

JULIE HYMAN: A big announcement from luxury automaker Aston Martin today. And Yahoo Finance's Pras Subramanian has the latest. What's the announcement?

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: Yes, Aston Martin unveiling three new vehicles today. Now, well, one of them was an F1 race car for the upcoming season.

JULIE HYMAN: Not one that we're going to buy.

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: No, the AMR24, which I would love to drive, but not really. But Aston is targeting fifth place or higher in the overall standings for the season, which kicks off next month. Now, the team had a strong 2023, but thinks they can build off that success with an improved race car.

More importantly, the British luxury brand also debuted its updated Vantage sports car and the Vantage GT3 race car. The road-- the road going Vantage, of course, super important in the entry level sports car category, where prices start around $150,000.

Now, Aston had some hiccups last year, production. But executive chairman Lawrence Stroll says those days are behind the company, especially after some successful launches. Here's what he had to say.

LAWRENCE STROLL: We've never had so many launches in one back to back period of time in the company's history and that just continues on our success of our DBX SUV, which we launched three years ago. We've taken 20% share of the automotive luxury SUV high-performance market in three years, quite a feat. So carrying on from the success of DBS to DB12 onto Vantage. And next year will come with our first mid-engine hybrid program with Valhalla, so very exciting times for the company.

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: I mean, a pretty broad range of products there across the board from sports cars to ultra sports cars to SUVs. You know, speaking of that SUV, the DBX, we spoke about a year ago, you mentioned to me how that was the first car under your stewardship that got to that really interesting luxury metric, that 40% contribution margin. I know I was really intrigued by that. And I'm curious how is that going in terms of the business hitting those marks that you want to hit for a profitable and successful luxury brand.

LAWRENCE STROLL: Firstly, you have a very good memory. The DBX707 was the first vehicle under my stewardship that was launched with a minimum, I said, of 40% contribution margin. And I mentioned then and now it holds true that every vehicle to be launched after. The first was DB12, second will be Vantage, will all have a 40 plus percent contribution margin. So we're doing exactly that.

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: Interesting metric to watch there. Interesting guy, Lawrence stroll, very interesting, charismatic guy, who made a lot of money in the fashion industry in Canada. But anyway, you know, he also spoke about the demand picture there with the luxury consumer. He says that they're not seeing a recessionary mood from these clients. In fact, they're seeing the opposite. They're seeing considerable growth there. So it seems like stocks at all time highs. The possibility of rate cuts is not bad for the luxury consumer.

JULIE HYMAN: Interesting. I mean, that's kind of along the lines of what we've been hearing from some of on the retail side some of the luxury companies as well.

PRAS SUBRAMANIAN: Yeah, and the TOD'S Group getting possibly going private with L Catterton. This is really interesting stuff happening in luxury space.

JULIE HYMAN: There is. Well, thanks so much for bringing us that. Appreciate it.