Through the media drive occasion of the brand new Volkswagen Touareg earlier this week, Volkswagen Passenger Automobiles Malaysia (VPCM) held a Q&A session wherein senior officers fielded questions associated to the automotive and the corporate. Particularly, its managing director Denyu Bostandzhiev shared some attention-grabbing particulars concerning the way forward for the model.
Requested by paultan.org whether or not there will likely be any new fashions priced beneath the RM200,000 mark other than the Tiguan Allspace (which begins at RM164,190), Bostanzhiev mentioned: “There will likely be a automotive [in this price range]. I can not let you know now when precisely, however I’d say fairly quickly.”
The actual juicy half got here afterward, when the corporate boss indicated VPCM’s want to reintroduce a daily (learn: non-GTI or R) Golf someday sooner or later. “We are able to guarantee you that one thing is occurring with the Golf. All people’s ready for the traditional Golf. We’re engaged on it. We’d wish to have the total vary of the Golf. We now have been proudly owning the section and we’ll personal the section sooner or later as nicely, it belongs to us.”
Chances are you’ll do not forget that the present Mk8 Golf was launched right here in commonplace CKD R-Line guise again in July 2022 – after a protracted anticipate its value to be permitted – however was pulled from sale after lower than a yr. We are able to presume that it was killed because of gradual gross sales, probably because of its excessive RM170,560 value and its lack of driver help package.
The Mk8 Golf R-Line was pulled from sale after lower than a yr
A rejigged specification with a cheaper price and/or the inclusion of VW’s IQ.Drive security suite might make the enterprise case for the usual Mk8 Golf work, however VPCM may as an alternative be ready for the brand new Mk8.5 mannequin to deliver the variant again. That automotive has already been comprehensively dominated out for this yr, with the Touareg and the special-edition fiftieth anniversary Golf GTI (the latter will likely be restricted to 50 items, it’s been confirmed) being the corporate’s massive launches for 2024.
However that’s not all – Bostandzhiev additionally confirmed there will likely be one other new mannequin to assist offset the price of localising the CKD Touareg. The automotive is being domestically assembled in Pekan, Pahang, the primary time that is taking place exterior of VW’s Bratislava plant in Slovakia.
The corporate is simply concentrating on to seize a ten% share of the already tiny premium govt SUV market in Malaysia – a section dominated by the also-CKD BMW X5 and Mercedes-Benz GLE. That’s not plenty of quantity for such an enormous funding; the Touareg, let’s not neglect, relies on the MLB Evo platform not shared with different Volkswagen model fashions.
“[We need to] share applied sciences, share investments. I’m not allowed to let you know, however one thing is cooking. There will likely be a unique mannequin that can seem,” mentioned Bostandzhiev.
The usage of the time period “completely different mannequin” is vital, as a result of it hints that it gained’t merely be a variant of the Touareg, that means we’ll need to look exterior the VW model. At the moment, there are 5 giant SUV fashions constructed on the MLB Evo structure – the Audi Q7 and Q8, Porsche Cayenne, Bentley Bentayga and Lamborghini Urus.
The Cayenne is already being constructed right here on the Inokom plant in Kulim, Kedah; we will additionally rule out the Bentayga and the Urus given their exclusivity and market positioning, leaving solely the Audis because the viable choices. This tracks with feedback from Bostandzhiev (who can be MD of Audi distributor PHS Automotive Malaysia, or PHSAM) earlier this yr, wherein he confirmed the model’s plans to assemble automobiles domestically.
Serving to Ingolstadt’s case is the truth that each the Q7 and Q8 may be had with the Touareg’s 340 PS 3.0 litre turbocharged V6 and eight-speed ZF automated gearbox. Of the 2, the extra sensible Q7 – which just lately obtained its second facelift – is the one which makes probably the most sense given will probably be the quantity vendor, with the additional benefit of seven seats to additional differentiate it from the five-seater Touareg.
GALLERY: Volkswagen Golf Mk8.5
GALLERY: 2024 Audi Q7 facelift
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