Mitusbishi’s North American dealers have been trudging along with an aging, badge-engineered model line for years – but overseas? It’s a different story, and the 459 hp all-wheel drive ASX VR-e electric hot hatch shown here is plug-in proof.

Let’s get the technicalities out of the way: the Mitsubishi ASX VR-e isn’t built by Mitsubishi. It’s built in Taiwan by phone and TV manufacturing giant Foxconn under its Foxtron automotive brand. If you’re a cynic, you might argue that the ASX VR-e is just another example of a badge-engineered product meant to fill dealer showrooms.

To a romantic, though? Someone whose idea of Mitsubishi has more to do with turbocharged rally monsters and slick, high-tech GTs? That person might argue that Magna Steyr builds the iconic G-Wagen for Mercedes-Benz, and that doesn’t make it any less of a Mercedes. Similarly, Porsche built Harley-Davidson’s V-Rod and neither Mitsubishi or Chrysler built the OG Eclipse or Talon models – Diamond Star Motors did. Through those rosy lenses then, I tell you that this all-electric, ultra-fast, Foxtron-built Taiwanese hot hatch is well-equipped to be the spiritual successor to the Mitsubishi Galant VR-4/Lancer EVO.

Packing a relatively small and, as a consequence, relatively light weight 57.7 kWh li-ion battery sending power to a pair of electric motors delivering a combined 459 hp (342 kW) and ~516 lb-ft (700 Nm) of torque – good enough to launch the new EVO ASX VR-e from naught to sixty in less than 4.0 seconds. (!)

For those of you keeping score, that’s significantly more power than the most powerful combustion-engined Lancer EVO ever built, the UK-only Evo X FQ-440 MR with “just” 440 hp and more than 100 fewer lb-ft of torque.

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