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RPM TV Website | March 28, 2024

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Booming SUV market ignites baby Land Rover

Land Rover DC100 Defender Concept Land Rover DC100 Concept
Adam Schoeman

Land Rover says it is investigating the viability of a smaller, premium SUV, which will sit at the top of its segment, but below the Freelander.

This comes after an analysis by Swiss financiers, Credit Suisse, which  predicts that the market for B-segment SUVs is set to increase from 1 million units to 2,5 million units by 2020.

There is no doubt that the SUV market has experienced phenomenal growth in the past years, but the same can be said for premium small cars, such as Audi’s A1.

The inclusion of a vehicle in the Land Rover range that is smaller and more frugal, but that also satisfies a large part of what pulls buyers towards a SUV, could be a master move.

The Freelander has grown substantially over the last two generations, making it more of a scaled-down Discovery, and not a small Land Rover. This means that the risk of cannibalising Freelander sales with a new, smaller model is fairly low.

But because Land Rover’s platform does not have the same flexibility as Volkswagen’s MQB design, a drastically smaller SUV could require the creation of a brand new bespoke platform.

This will raise the costs of the project as additional research and development will need to go into designing a feasible set of underpinnings.

There is some hope though: Land Rover is part of the larger JLR, which contains both premium sedan manufacturer Jaguar, and its Indian powerhouse owner, Tata. Between the three manufacturers, there will surely be synergies for a new, shared platform, especially considering the difference in markets that they play in.

If the same platform was reused by Tata for a small SUV, then it is unlikely that it would step on the toes of Land Rover’s premium offering, since the fancy electronic off-road stuff can just be stripped out for Tata’s mainstream vehicle.

It is unlikely that we will see an early concept from Land Rover this year, but we are very eager to see how it plans to bring this vehicle to market.

Land Rover DC100 Concept

Land Rover DC100 Concept

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