volkswagen amarok 001
Marton Pettendy17 Aug 2016
NEWS

VW to produce Amarok-based SUV

Volkswagen confirms hard-core seven-seat SUV rival for Toyota Prado based on sold-out V6 Amarok ute

Volkswagen is developing a seven-seat SUV based on its Amarok ute to compete directly with Toyota's top-selling Prado – and it will be sold in Australia.

An Amarok-based off-road wagon was first alluded to at the June global launch of the facelifted Amarok line-up – including the first V6 diesel version – which goes on sale Down Under in November.

However, the German car-maker's answer to hard-core SUVs like the Prado and Ford Everest was confirmed yesterday in Melbourne by Volkswagen Group Australia, which confirmed it has already supplied its parent company with local sales forecasts as part of the new model's business case.

"There is some very serious development happening at the moment for an SUV based on Amarok, which will be quite a large passenger vehicle," said Carlos Santos, VGA's Commercial Vehicles director.

"It's not confirmed yet but it's been going on since the start of Amarok."

Santos said the Amarok-based five-door wagon would be powered by the same 3.0-litre turbo-diesel V6 that will be available in the facelifted Amarok from late this year.

"The discussion has been reignited because obviously this V6 engine is able to be sold in the US. The 2.0-litre would never get into the States, but the V6 is the same as the one in the [Porsche] Cayenne and [VW] Touareg and is a well proven engine.

"We've got the volume to justify the investment."

Questioned about the potential of an Amarok-based wagon at a media function to announce five new SUVs within the next 30 months, Volkswagen's Australian managing director Michael Bartsch said:

"There's a lot of research going on in America at the moment. As you can imagine, Volkswagen knows that they have a challenge in the SUV segment.

"We've announced our SUV model range is expanding to five here. Certainly in the US they're looking at a larger one, like a Q7-type size vehicle, so I think your observation is one that other people have made."

It's not known how far away Volkswagen's all-new Prado fighter is away from Australian showrooms, but it is likely to be a popular entrant in the nation's fourth largest new vehicle sales segment behind small cars, medium SUVs and 4x4 utes.

VGA yesterday also confirmed the upcoming Amarok V6 is already a sell-out, with more than 2000 potential buyers already in line for the 300 examples allocated to Australia this year.

"We're currently well and truly oversubscribed on what supplies we have coming this year, so it's a nice problem to have," said Santos

"We're probably not getting the numbers we want to have this year. The level of enquiry is high despite the fact we haven't done any marketing for the car yet. We're fighting for more production all the time

"We have more than 2000 real leads asking for test drives. Right now we're probably getting about 300 cars for this year. Next year the numbers haven’t been finalised yet."

Santos said V6 Amarok production will free up once production moves from Germany to Argentina.

"Initially the V6 is coming out of Germany … until production moves to Pacheco where they can do the volume for us, so we'll be short for V6 initially.

"Turkey, UK, South Africa are all big markets. We're fighting for more V6 production all the time because the demand is there for us."

VGA forecasts it will sell about 10,000 facelifted Amaroks Down Under next year, split between four-cylinder 'Core' and 'Core Plus' models, and six-cylinder 'Highline' and 'Highline Plus' models – the latter effectively replacing the previous Ultimate flagship.

The special Amarok 'Aventura' launch edition (pictured) will not become available here until next April.

The facelifted Amarok represents the first major upgrade since the Amarok first arrived in 2011 and brings revised interior and exterior cosmetics and equipment, including Volkswagen's latest infotainment tech.

The first V6 version, meantime, will be the only V6 diesel ute in its class and delivers 550Nm of torque and 165kW of power – increasing to 180kW in overboost mode.

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