Feature
Inside Line Exclusive: Ford and Dodge Ready to Take on Scion
Detroit's new concept-based small cars will arrive from south of the border
Dodge has chosen an unlikely venue — the 2006 Geneva Motor Show — to debut a new small car that it hopes will be a potent weapon in its battle against the torrent of subcompacts flooding North America from Japan and Korea.
What's more unusual about the Dodge Hornet concept isn't necessarily the fact that parent DaimlerChrysler may team with fellow German auto giant Volkswagen on the car's development, but that the production version, tentatively due in model-year 2009, is expected to be assembled in Mexico — hardly Detroit or Stuttgart's backyard.
Motown rival Ford Motor Company, likewise, is working on its own small Scion-fighter — in fact, a brace of them — also to be built in Mexico, with some engineering sourced from Ford of Europe and from Mazda in Japan. One of the new B-segment models reportedly will be called "Bronco," with retro styling cues derived both from the original 1966 Bronco and the 2004 concept vehicle of the same name. The Ford twins are due to reach U.S. showrooms in late 2008, as 2009 models.
Making Dodges in Mexico
The Chrysler Group has been shopping for more than a year for an affordable small car and a low-cost production source, and reportedly scouted locations and potential partners in China, Korea and Brazil, among others.
Enter VW, which last month signed off on a deal to buy minivans from Chrysler in 2008. As a quid pro quo, according to European sources familiar with the discussions, Wolfsburg is expected to provide Auburn Hills with a version of its Polo small-car platform on which to base a new Dodge subcompact for North America and Europe.
The Dodge Hornet concept, which will be unveiled in Switzerland on February 28, is said to provide an accurate glimpse of the new VW-based Dodge small car. It is a roomy five-door hatchback with compact exterior dimensions, powered by a twincam, 1.6-liter, four-cylinder engine.
Rather than being a smaller clone of the new Dodge Caliber compact, however, the Hornet appears to set the Dodge brand on a fresh styling course that draws more inspiration from recent Japanese small-car designs than from Europe or North America.
Supplier sources say the current plan is for VW to build the small Dodge at its Beetle/Jetta plant in Puebla, Mexico, beginning in late 2008 or early 2009.
Ford looks back
Ford, meanwhile, continues to pursue its retro tack, building on the Bronco concept that was revealed at the 2004 North American International Auto Show in Detroit.
The neo-Bronco and a companion five-door hatchback are to be aimed, like the Dodge Hornet, at Gen-Y buyers who have been drawn to the Scion xA and xB and are expected to be the primary audience for such recent and upcoming entries as the Honda Fit, the Nissan Versa and the Toyota Yaris.
Like DaimlerChrysler, Dearborn searched around the globe for the right combination of platform and production sourcing, rejecting one proposal to import a small Fiesta-based utility vehicle called "EcoSport" from its Brazilian subsidiary.
Ford's Japanese affiliate Mazda already is doing the engineering development work on the next-generation Fiesta for Europe, Asia and Latin America, but the new B-segment platform was deemed too expensive for the '09 baby Bronco, which Ford hopes to price from under $10,000.
So two strategic decisions have been taken — one, to base the Bronco on the current Fiesta to keep costs down and, two, to assemble the car at Ford of Mexico's Cuautitlán plant, which currently makes the Fiesta-based Ikon sedan for Latin American markets. Originally, the Bronco was to have gone into production in fall 2007, but the program recently was delayed by a year and a second model added.
GM sticks with Korea
General Motors apparently won't follow its Motown counterparts to Mexico. Chevrolet has been importing the Aveo subcompact from Korean affiliate GM-Daewoo, and is said to be evaluating a proposal to add an even smaller entry-level model, based on the Daewoo Matiz and also imported from Korea, in 2008 or 2009 as a sub-$9,000 price leader in North America.
The next two to three years will determine which company's strategy is the right one. And of course, if several Chinese automakers elect to enter the U.S. market with even cheaper small cars of their own design, the battle lines will almost certainly be redrawn yet again.
What's more unusual about the Dodge Hornet concept isn't necessarily the fact that parent DaimlerChrysler may team with fellow German auto giant Volkswagen on the car's development, but that the production version, tentatively due in model-year 2009, is expected to be assembled in Mexico — hardly Detroit or Stuttgart's backyard.
Motown rival Ford Motor Company, likewise, is working on its own small Scion-fighter — in fact, a brace of them — also to be built in Mexico, with some engineering sourced from Ford of Europe and from Mazda in Japan. One of the new B-segment models reportedly will be called "Bronco," with retro styling cues derived both from the original 1966 Bronco and the 2004 concept vehicle of the same name. The Ford twins are due to reach U.S. showrooms in late 2008, as 2009 models.
Making Dodges in Mexico
The Chrysler Group has been shopping for more than a year for an affordable small car and a low-cost production source, and reportedly scouted locations and potential partners in China, Korea and Brazil, among others.
Enter VW, which last month signed off on a deal to buy minivans from Chrysler in 2008. As a quid pro quo, according to European sources familiar with the discussions, Wolfsburg is expected to provide Auburn Hills with a version of its Polo small-car platform on which to base a new Dodge subcompact for North America and Europe.
The Dodge Hornet concept, which will be unveiled in Switzerland on February 28, is said to provide an accurate glimpse of the new VW-based Dodge small car. It is a roomy five-door hatchback with compact exterior dimensions, powered by a twincam, 1.6-liter, four-cylinder engine.
Rather than being a smaller clone of the new Dodge Caliber compact, however, the Hornet appears to set the Dodge brand on a fresh styling course that draws more inspiration from recent Japanese small-car designs than from Europe or North America.
Supplier sources say the current plan is for VW to build the small Dodge at its Beetle/Jetta plant in Puebla, Mexico, beginning in late 2008 or early 2009.
Ford looks back
Ford, meanwhile, continues to pursue its retro tack, building on the Bronco concept that was revealed at the 2004 North American International Auto Show in Detroit.
The neo-Bronco and a companion five-door hatchback are to be aimed, like the Dodge Hornet, at Gen-Y buyers who have been drawn to the Scion xA and xB and are expected to be the primary audience for such recent and upcoming entries as the Honda Fit, the Nissan Versa and the Toyota Yaris.
Like DaimlerChrysler, Dearborn searched around the globe for the right combination of platform and production sourcing, rejecting one proposal to import a small Fiesta-based utility vehicle called "EcoSport" from its Brazilian subsidiary.
Ford's Japanese affiliate Mazda already is doing the engineering development work on the next-generation Fiesta for Europe, Asia and Latin America, but the new B-segment platform was deemed too expensive for the '09 baby Bronco, which Ford hopes to price from under $10,000.
So two strategic decisions have been taken — one, to base the Bronco on the current Fiesta to keep costs down and, two, to assemble the car at Ford of Mexico's Cuautitlán plant, which currently makes the Fiesta-based Ikon sedan for Latin American markets. Originally, the Bronco was to have gone into production in fall 2007, but the program recently was delayed by a year and a second model added.
GM sticks with Korea
General Motors apparently won't follow its Motown counterparts to Mexico. Chevrolet has been importing the Aveo subcompact from Korean affiliate GM-Daewoo, and is said to be evaluating a proposal to add an even smaller entry-level model, based on the Daewoo Matiz and also imported from Korea, in 2008 or 2009 as a sub-$9,000 price leader in North America.
The next two to three years will determine which company's strategy is the right one. And of course, if several Chinese automakers elect to enter the U.S. market with even cheaper small cars of their own design, the battle lines will almost certainly be redrawn yet again.
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