Shanghai-VW spawns electric sub brand to rival FAW-VW’s Kai Li electric sub brand

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The new vehicle application catalog released by China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT)  earlier today clearly shows Shanghai Volkswagen’s self-developed brand will come into being soon. Its Chinese name is 天越 (Pronounced as “Tian Yue”), and its English name is Tantos.

Based on the previous spy shots and the catalog number of Tantos’ first all-electric car, the electric car is likely to be developed from the Lavida compact sedan which Shanghai-VW developed themselves.

Actually, the “天越” brand was registered by Shanghai Volkswagen as early as 2007. Shanghai Volkswagen re-registered the Chinese brand this year, and it seems the brand’s logo was registered at the same time. The logo looks like the Chinese character “天”, and also looks like an eagle with wings opening.

It seems Volkswagen does not want to take risks in its electric vehicle strategy. It does not use new styling and just modify on the existing models. FAW-Volkswagen’s Kaili electric car is based on Bora, while Shanghai Volkswagen’s Tantos electric car is likely to be based on Lavida. By doing this, it can be received by the market quickly, and avoid wasting R&D investment in case the electric cars do not gain sales momentum.