Our reporters empty their notebooks to round up a week in gossip from across the automotive industry
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
Source: Autocar
