In this week's round-up of automotive gossip, we hear why Lynk&Co won't bring Chinese SUVs to UK shores (at least for now), what to expect from the next Brabham and much more.
No UK outing for Lynk&Co's home SUVs
Lynk&Co is gearing up to up to launch its unique car subscription service in Europe, but the Geely-owned Chinese brand has no immediate plans to offer its home-market saloon or other SUVs here. “We want to stick to the 01, in line with our ‘brutally simple’ business model,” said CEO Alain Visser. “A second car would be electric. We’ve chosen the hybrid now, because we think that’s currently the more accessible technology given the limited infrastructure for electric cars. We won’t offer the 02 or 03.”
More Brabham in the works
Revived motorsport outfit Brabham intends to follow up the recent launch of its road-legal BT62R hypercar with further road cars “accompanied by homologated GT3, GT4 and/or GTE” models, the company told Autocar. The next Brabham model was said to have “hypercar performance with the core DNA of the brand at the fore, with best-in-class chassis dynamics and driver engagement”. It is expected to be launched before the end of this year.
XE and XF still key, but for how long?
Do Jaguar's XE and XF saloons have a long-term future? “It’s a difficult one,” according to Jaguar Land Rover’s UK sales boss, Scott Dicken. “The XE and XF are a key part of our range for now,” he said. “The cars are better than they’ve ever been. We’re looking at how the marketplace is evolving as we go into the future. While it’s a challenging market, [saloons] are a very important product for us. We need to look at the lifetime benefit not only for us but also retailers. The XE and XF are really strong used cars.”
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Lynk&Co enters Europe with unique membership model for 01 SUV
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yes agree along with a 5 dr hatch
I can't help but feel an Audi A3 Golf Merc A class type vehicle would be a massive increase in sales with their 1.5 petrol engine starting off the range.
Ski Kid wrote:
Exactly what I was going to say. Make the XE smaller - not longer.
XE and XF are too similar in
XE and XF are too similar in size and looks. A LWB XE would do as a single replacement. It should be EV capable, but also offer ICE. JLR are global, and most of the world is a long way behind Europe in adopting EVs. An Estate version to replace the XF would be good too. But i have no idea if they can sell enough of them to make the numbers work. Sorting reliability would be the best place to start.
Future Jaguar line up
It is clear the saloon market is dwindling can the company afford to have XE and XF when they almost compete with each other?
If I was JLR here is what the Jaguar lineup I would have:
- Merge XE and XF into a £35k electric saloon
- Have new electric XJ as the luxury halo saloon
- Have two SUVs - mid point F Pace replacement and a J Pace
- Two sports cars
An F-Type replacement and a CX75 style halo car. The CX75 would be hand built low volume and expensive. Project 7/8 have shown there are enough enthusiasts to support this.
Order of the Ditch wrote:
I agree with all of that. The sad thing is that the refreshed XF is the car that should have been launched in the first place. The interior is now competitive, before it wasn't.