The announcement comes in the wake of ever-stricter emissions regulations around the globe, notably in China and in the European Union. The firm isn’t going to turn the tap off overnight, though. Toyota owns an 8.7 percent stake in Subaru, and the two partners are jointly developing a pair of electric cars due out during the 2020s. Others will inevitably follow. By 2030, hybrid and electric models will represent at least 40 percent of Subaru’s annual global output.

In the meantime, Subaru is funneling an immense amount of money into adapting Toyota’s hybrid technology to its vehicles. The gasoline-electric variant of the Crosstrek introduced in 2018 a product of this collaboration. Executives outlined plans to release a “strong hybrid” again built with Toyota parts, though they stopped short of providing more details. They also stressed their goal isn’t to achieve mere badge-engineering.

“Although we’re using Toyota technology, we want to make hybrids that are distinctly Subaru. It’s not only about reducing CO2 emissions. We need to further improve vehicle safety and the performance of our all-wheel drive,” affirmed Tetsuo Onuki, Subaru’s chief technology officer, during a briefing Reuters attended.

His comments suggest all-wheel drive will continue to define the members of Subaru’s range in the electric-only era. The configuration has been one of the brand’s strongest selling points for decades, and it helped it grow from a niche brand peddling obscure cars to a major mainstream automaker in the United States, so giving it up would be marketing suicide. The horizontally-opposed engine is Subaru’s second signature, it’s what the C-shaped daytime running lights seen on its cars are inspired by, but Onuki confirmed its rumbling days will come to an end.

This article originally appeared on Autoblog, the complete authority for news, reviews and car-buying research.

The fact that people can buy an Outback with a turbo engine for the first time in years might be enough to sway some car shoppers, but that might not be the most important feature here. Subaru has confirmed that — just like last year — all versions of the 2020 Outback will come with the automaker’s EyeSight driver assist system. That means you’ll find a pair of road-facing cameras on either side of the rear view mirror, constantly monitoring the road in front of you to optimize cruise control and automatically apply the brakes when the worst nearly happens.

While it probably won’t help keep you alive the EyeSight can, it is worth noting that Subaru took a surprisingly big step forward with its infotainment system this year. With its 2019 models, Outbacks had touchscreen displays that topped out at 8-inches diagonal — functional, certainly, but nothing to really write home about.

This year, though, Subaru made an 11.6-inch vertical touch panel standard on all Outback models save for the most basic. If nothing else, fiddling with the podcasts and saved tracks on your phone via Apple CarPlay or Android Auto just got a lot easier. And since we’re talking about Subaru — a company that seems to persist because of folksy charm as much as technical ingenuity — it’s little surprise that the big screen can also run an app called Chimani that lets you read up on all 417 of the country’s national parks. Granted, this app partnership isn’t anything hugely new, but just tell me that isn’t the most Subaru thing this touchscreen could be used for.