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Traditionally, it takes a decade or more for a new car to find its footing, but China‘s Qoros is doing its damnedest to run before it walks. Founded in 2007, Qoros is a joint-venture between Chery and Israel Corporation, a company best-known in automotive circles for helping to fund Better Place.
With an impressively sized display said to be modeled on the Silk Road, Qoros unveiled its production 3 Sedan, as well as its 3 Cross Hybrid concept and 3 Estate concept. We had the chance to sit in the 3 Sedan, and it looks and feels surprisingly accomplished considering its brief development time. In particular, the cabin has a pronounced Volkswagen aesthetic about it – so much so that we were half-tempted to ask whether Wolfsburg provided some of the switchgear and styling help. The interior is dominated by a unique eight-inch capacitive touchscreen system, whose functionality is divided into quadrants (where have we heard that before?), accessible with a two-finger swipe.
The Qoros 3 will be available at launch with either a naturally aspirated or turbocharged 1.6-liter four-cylinder gasoline engine tied to either a manual gearbox or a dual-clutch transmission. Qoros also showed a pair of showcars, the Qoros 3 Estate Concept and Qoros 3 Cross Hybrid Concept. At a glance, both look like production-ready vehicles.
Qoros plans to launch later this year in its home market of China, pushing westward into Europe early next year. While there were originally plans for North American sales, Autoblog has learned that the combination of a mature market and economic malaise has proven to be enough to keep the company’s US and Canadian ambitions at bay for the foreseeable future.
And what of the Chinese auto industry’s traditional blind spot, quality? The company is touting its executives and engineers‘ histories at other, more established automakers as proof that it will build a robust product. What companies have their execs worked at? BMW, General Motors, Jaguar Land Rover, Saab and Volvo. Hmmm…
Continue reading Qoros brand debuts, hits the ground running with 3 Sedan
Qoros brand debuts, hits the ground running with 3 Sedan originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 06 Mar 2013 03:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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