This paper presents design feasibility study and development of a new hybrid excitation flux switching motor (HEFSM) as a contender for traction drives in hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs). Initially, the motor general construction, the basic working principle and the design concept of the proposed HEFSM are outlined. Then, the initial drive performances of the proposed HEFSM are evaluated based on 2D-FEA, in which the design restrictions, specifications and target performances are similar with conventional interior permanent magnet synchronous motor (IPMSM) used in HEV. Since the initial results fail to achieve the target performances, deterministic design optimization approach is used to treat several design parameters. After several cycles of optimization, the proposed motor makes it possible to obtain the target torque and power of 333 Nm and 123 kW, respectively. In addition, due to definite advantage of robust rotor structure of HEFSM, rotor mechanical stress prediction at maximum speed of 12,400 r/min is much lower than the mechanical stress in conventional IPMSM. Finally, the maximum torque and power density of the final design HEFSM are approximately 11.41 Nm/kg and 5.55 kW/kg, respectively, which is 19.98% and 58.12% more than the torque and power density in existing IPMSM for Lexus RX400h.