Smart is mulling a successor to the Forfour as it looks to justify the huge cost of creating the incoming #2’s new bespoke platform.
If it gets the green light, it will cap a huge overhaul of the Mercedes- and Geely-owned brand’s line-up, which will include the launch of the recently announced #2 city car next year, along with major updates to the #1 crossover and #3 coupé-crossover. They will join the #5 SUV flagship, deliveries of which are set to begin in the coming months.
Smart’s European CEO Dirk Adelmann told Autocar at the Munich motor show a new Forfour is something the brand is looking at, albeit there are no concrete launch plans "yet". The previous four-seat city car went out of production at the turn of the decade.
Like the #2 sibling, itself a successor to the popular Fortwo, a new ForFour will likely be designed and engineered for Europe, and use the same underpinnings.
Any design will follow that of the #2, which, while not yet revealed, “needed to look like a successor", said Adelmann.
While the #4 has not yet been fully green-lit, Adelmann said such a car is needed in order to justify the huge cost of creating the #2’s new bespoke platform. “We need the economies of scale,” he said. “The tricky part was to get it small enough for the #2; it’s much easier to expand slightly.”
Adelmann confirmed the platform is likely to use a dual-motor set-up but wouldn’t confirm any other technical details, adding: “The wishlist features we gave to engineering was a very small turning cycle – the same as the last Fortwo – to make [the #2] really practical in city centres.”
In a first for Smart, the platform is being developed jointly by Geely in China and Mercedes in Europe, given that the car is built mainly with a focus on the European market. This differs from the #1, #3 and #5, which were all engineered by Geely but designed by Mercedes.
Join the debate
Add your comment