The Mercedes-Benz A-Class will end production in 2025, according to a report in Germany’s Handelsblatt.
Citing information provided by internal Mercedes-Benz sources, Handelsblatt says Mercedes-Benz board members have made a decision not to replace today’s A-Class at the end of its current model cycle.
The report suggests the fourth-generation A-Class, introduced in 2018, will continue to be produced in both hatchback and saloon bodystyles up until 2025. However, successors are not planned, says the Düsseldorf-based financial and business newspaper.
Handelsblatt also reports that the closely related Mercedes-Benz B-Class MPV will cease production in 2025.
The decision to axe the A- and B-Class comes as Mercedes-Benz looks to increase its number of pure-electric models, while ramping up the number of higher-profit luxury models in its portfolio.
The German car maker is not abandoning the compact car segment completely, though. In the future, it intends to concentrate production around successor models to today’s Mercedes-Benz CLA saloon (and CLA Shooting Brake), Mercedes-Benz GLA and Mercedes-Benz GLB, according to the Handelsblatt report.
Suggestions are that the next-generation CLA saloon, CLA Shooting brake, GLA and GLB will switch from today’s MFA platform to Mercedes-Benz’s new MMA structure.
The MMA platform has been conceived to underpin both hybrid and pure-electric models, and will adopt a new MB.OS operating system, according to Mercedes-Benz’s chief technology officer, Markus Schäfer.
“The vehicles of our entry luxury MM platform will be based on the MB.OS software architecture for the first time in 2024. Instead of seven, we plan to offer four models in this segment,” he said.
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Good news for Ford, Vauxhall, Volkswagen teal - they can reclaim their traditional small family hatch markets if the Premium brands are pulling back just like the good old days when aspirational types would have lusted after an Escort Ghia!
This is the beginning of pricing Mr and Mrs Joe Average off of the road.
Building what they can sell?, no point doing them if they're not popular, think other brands might do the same.
They can sell plenty of A Classes, it's a fixture in the UKs Tope ten selling cars. the point is the profit margin on them is small, Mercedes, amongst other brands, have realised, in Covid and chip shortage times, that they can make more money selling less, high end models. Which is fine if others fill the gaps underneath them, but if all manufacturers decide the same thing then private transportation returns to being a preserve of the wealthy.