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VW Lavida - First shots

8 April 2008 9 Comments

The VW Lavida is to be a ‘China Only’ car, and has had Chinese motor fans going crazy over the past few weeks - ever since the rumors of a new VW were aired. Fans can now rest at ease, the VW Lavida is shown below in all of its glory.

lavida-spy.jpg lavida-spy1.jpg lavida-spy3.jpg

lavida-spy4.jpg lavida-spy5.jpg lavida-spy6.jpg

The Chinese motoring press are hinting that the Lavida will be a mini ‘luxury’ car, possibly packing some of the features normally seen on the high end Phaeton.

Rumor has it, the Lavida is built off of the VW Bora platform, but is 100mm longer than the Bora sedan. This way, the Lavida will be in direct competition with the new Buick Excelle when both are launched towards the end of this year. Motor pro’s are guessing that the Lavida will come with either a 1.8 or a 2.0l engine, and probably not the 1.8T that is favored in the VW Sagitar. Price wise, we can see the Lavida falling in the 80 to 100,000rmb range.

9 Comments »

  • mark said:

    They could at least have given it a wash!

  • Bob said:

    I like how they put an Excelle sticker on the back…

  • Ash (author) said:

    well spotted, I wonder if Sohu are barking up the wrong tree?

  • jackson liu said:

    although the concept was a big hit, this production version shows nothing interesting now…
    .
    it says above it’s going to cost 80-100k rmb. How much does the Jetta cost in China (the last iteration of it, I think it’s called sagitar or something, in China…) ??

  • Bob said:

    I think the Sagitar runs around 100-140…So Im kinda wondering, what does the sagitar have that the lavida doesn’t have (besides that its a tad bigger & the 1.8t option) - if its not much difference, and just because the name (ie “I drive a Sagitar vs a Santana” mentality) , the Lavida seems like a smart alternative?

  • Bob said:

    Or they might be doing the Ford Fiesta thing, by putting the competitor’s logo on it while testing it. It would be kinda funny if something horribly went wrong during the test and there was media coverage stating that the other brand had issues ;-)

    …then again…aggghh…guess we’ll just wait and see when they make an official announcement :-)

  • Ash (author) said:

    If only it was that cheap! The cheapest Sagitar is 120k for the 1.6 rising to 180k for the luxury 1.8T. There is a 2.0l tucked in the middle of those options from 140 to 180k.

  • Bob said:

    Oh ok :-) - then comparing between the highest end Lavida vs the lowest end Sagitar might be interesting to see what you do or don’t get ;-) Now I think about it - how much does the Bora run for nowadays?

  • mark said:

    Adverts for the Lavida are up in Shanghai already.

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