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Mercedes delays the US launch of its all-electric SUV until 2021

Mercedes will focus on the growing demand in Europe first.

Mercedes' EQC all-electric SUV was initially scheduled to arrive in the US in early 2020. If you were hoping to buy the vehicle stateside, you'll have to wait a little longer. Mercedes has rescheduled the launch date to 2021.

The EQC arrived in Europe earlier this year, and apparently it "generated high interest," enough so that Mercedes' parent company Daimler made a "strategic decision to first support the growing customer demand" in Europe.

The EQC base model is expected to start at $67,900 -- less than the $74,800 Audi E-Tron and the $84,990 Tesla's Model X. Both of those models are on sale now, so they have a head start. Delaying the sale of the EQC in the US will likely cost Mercedes a significant number of sales.

As The Verge points out, the US is on par with, if not behind, Europe when it comes to EV sales, in part because Europe has strict emissions regulations. Beginning in 2020, those regulations will stipulate that only five precent of each automaker's fleet can exceed 95 grams of CO2 per kilometer, Autoblog explains. By 2021, the regulations will be even stricter, so Daimler's decision could be an attempt to comply and avoid fines.

When the EQC does finally reach the states we can expect high-end luxury and the MBUX infotainment system.

The full-statement, which Mercedes shared with dealers last week, is below:

"The EQC launch in Europe and other markets earlier in 2019 generated high interest worldwide for the EQC. In a recent direction from Daimler AG, it is a strategic decision to first support the growing customer demand for the EQC in Europe. As a result of this decision, the U.S. market launch date of the Mercedes-Benz EQC will be rescheduled to 2021 (originally Q1 2020)."