Dozens of new cars launch every year, but the launch of a whole new auto brand is a far rarer event. Geely, the Chinese automaker that also owns Volvo, is rolling out a new one: Lynk & Co?yes, that’s the name?and it’s set to launch globally with a raft of new models and ambitious sales targets. How ambitious" Half a million cars a year by 2021.
The brand will kick off with the production-ready compact SUV that you see here, unveiled yesterday in Sweden alongside a considerably more zany coupe-sedan concept that drops broad hints that something lower and sleeker will follow. The SUV will be known simply as the 01?what we presume is a deliberate contrast to the screwball name of the brand. The company claims the cars will be sold in all major markets including the United States, where sales are promised to start in 2018, a year behind the introduction in other markets.
These are grandiose ambitions, but the carmaking potential certainly exists. All of its models are to use the same Volvo-developed Compact Modular Architecture that will underpin the Swedish brand’s next generation of small cars. Lynk & Co models will be built by Geely in China, but the emphasis is on the fact they’ve been designed and engineered in Europe (as apparently even the Chinese prefer to buy non-Chinese brands).
The 01 sets out much of the visual language for the new brand. Geely?s design director, Peter Horbury, who was formerly in charge of styling for both V...