The decision from Bentley to explore the idea of its first all electric car is not so much to follow current high-end carmaker trends – Aston Martin will also be going electric via its Lagonda brand, Jaguar is already introducing electric cars, and Ferrari is considering building one too – but rather to tackle its own huge environmental impact. Bentley's current range is full of gas-guzzling V8s and W12, so a popular electric offering would go some way to offsetting the impact of the petrol-powered models.

"When is the first full-electric Bentley? That is currently in the decision process, but our target is definitely before 2025," Bentley CEO Adrian Hallmark, who took over the running of Bentley at the start of this year, told Reuters. "It was taking stock of all the models, all the powertrains, all the future technologies that we needed to invest in and re-cut the plan to be more electrified than we were.