Our photographers managed to capture a heavily camouflaged vehicle from a mysterious brand. The shapes do look familiar but at the same time, it's not obvious as to what exactly we're looking at here. Do you have any idea what it could be?
Let's get one thing out of the way, this is an all-electric family crossover of some sort. Given its proportions and no tail-pipes, it was fairly easy to establish this. Now that I've categorized it, let's dig deeper into what it could be.
Mystery Electric Crossover
You look at the face and I bet you said, Maserati. The vertical strips sticking out from what could be a grille, (or not) this is an EV, after all, and that pronounced snout might have led you to believe so. However, I'm not really sure that's what it is and I hope I am right. I mean where are the portholes, which is a Maserati hallmark?
Plus, adding another crossover would dilute the Maserati brand even further in my opinion. The Levante and recently launched Grecale might bring in the numbers, but I'm not sure what it's doing to the Pedigree of the revered Italian marque.
Despite the heavy camouflage, a pronounced crease running the entire length of the vehicle, and the fenders that are probably hiding body cladding are easy to spot. You also won't miss the roof rails, a sunroof, proper door handles, and the mirrors with cameras sticking below them, which are perhaps part of a 360-degree setup. Given how long the wheelbase is, it appears that this vehicle is a family hauler.
But I guess it is from the rear where the VW connection seems to be more prominent. The spoiler at the rear and the light bar that spans the full width of the vehicle is very Audi, isn't it? The overall form is reminiscent of the VW group EVs that employ the VW group's MEB platform.
They include vehicles like the VW ID.4,->https://www.topspeed.com/cars/volkswagen/2022-volkswagen-id4-ar194331.html] the Skoda Enyaq, and the Audi Q4 e-Tron. So could this be a similar vehicle for the SEAT brand? This is pure speculation, I might be completely wrong here.
Could it be something from China where brands are notorious for doing a cut copy paste job? Another Chinese copycat car? Considering this vehicle was spotted in Europe, it could potentially be a future BYD of some sort from China. The auto-giant has plans to commence European operations soon. This mysterious MPV also appears to share a lot of design elements with the Maxus D60, although that vehicle is a size bigger.
Togg Electirc SUV
Okay, enough mucking about. This is the TOGG Electric SUV. Türkiyenin Otomobili Girişim Grubu or TOGG is Turkey's first-ever domestic auto manufacturer. Designed in collaboration with Pininfarina, the concept SUV was first unveiled over two years ago. Look up front and the boomerang-shaped LED sitting in the bumper as well as the head and taillights on this test mule are identical to the press car. But what really confirms that this is indeed the TOGG SUV are the rims.
As it is an EV, TOGG has revealed that there will the option to choose from two battery sizes that offer between 186 miles and 310 miles respectively. You can either have rear or all-wheel drive with the single motor RWD variant dishing out 200 horsepower whereas the more powerful dual-motor should offer 400 horsepower. Performance should be brisk with a claimed 0-62 mph time of just 4.8 seconds for the AWD variant.
It is not clear whether this crossover SUV will make it Stateside, but in Europe, the Togg SUV will take on mid-size heavyweights like the Audi Q5, the BMW X3, and the Mercedes GLC. Pricing, or rather undercutting its main competition will determine the success of this upcoming SUV from Turkey.