FUTURE MODELS
Sweden aiming to lead the pace with Volvo’s XC40
Volvo’s XC40 will bring style and new tech to the small crossover fight in 2018
The booming small crossover battle is about to get even hotter with Volvo packing a cornucopia of new technical and design ideas into its smallest SUV ever. In a first for the Swedish marque, the XC40 has pushed Volvo’s brand in to the fight between the BMW X1 and X3, the Audi Q2 and Q3, Mercedes-Benz’s ordinary GLA and Range Rover’s booming Evoque. The first car to be built off the brand’s new compact modular architecture, it sits beneath the successful XC60 and XC90 models, but is more of a "cousin rather than a sibling", according to Volvo’s vice-president of design, Robin Page. Despite the widespread hullabaloo surrounding the company’s recent announcement of its future electrified strategy for 2021, the XC40 will only launch with four-cylinder turbodiesel and four-cylinder turbo petrol power, and only in all-wheel drive. The XC40 will have to wait for electrification, although Volvo’s new car director, Alexander Petrofski, insists it is pre-engineered for both battery-electric ...
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