Start with what the General Motors Hy-wire is: a 4-door station wagon with Motor Single electric Power: 60 kW, built from 2002, in the decade of stability control, dual-clutch gearboxes and the first serious hybrids. What it meant takes a little longer. The shape is credited to Adrian Chernoff.
The story
The Hy-wire (Hydrogen drive-by-wire) is a concept car from General Motors originally introduced in January 2002. The car runs on hydrogen fuel cells and uses a drive-by-wire system, meaning that the car is controlled electronically. GM asked school children to name the car, and one of them suggested "Hy-wire". In 2003, General Motors stated that it was confident that it could produce a commercially viable model by 2010.
What is underneath
The engine is Motor Single electric Power: 60 kW. On the scales it comes to GVWR 4,185 lb. The layout matters: the engine drives the front wheels, the packaging choice that gives a small car a big cabin. The wheelbase is 3,114 mm (122.6 inches). These are manufacturer figures carried by Wikipedia and Wikidata, not road-test measurements.
Its place in the line
In the GM (General Motors) line-up the General Motors Hy-wire has a clear place: it replaced the GM AUTOnomy. The cars a buyer would have weighed it against include the Citroën C3, the Honda Accord, the Porsche Cayenne. Nearby in the GM (General Motors) catalogue sit the 1955 Chevrolet and the 1957 Chevrolet.