Aston Martin Pays the Price for All New Platform

Investors are getting more and more strict when it comes to allowing people to borrow their money and it seems as if Aston Martin is getting the short end of that stick. The British sports car maker has secured a £304 million bond - about $440 million at the current rates - from global investors at a rather high 9.25% interest over the next seven years. That’s a 3-4% increase over the typical interest rate. Desperate or not, Aston Martin now has the money to design an all new platform for their full line of sports cars, including the DB9, Vantage and Rapide. Expect the new line to debut in 2015 or 2016 with the first details of the new design and production engineering showing up in a concept car sometime in 2012.

Before the British automaker moves to the new platform, however, their current VH platform will have to be modified to obey the new Federal FMVSS pedestrian impact rules. This re-engineered platform will be used for facelift versions of all three models. The new models will also benefit from new skin panels, revised interiors, and tweaked chassis and engines.