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Choosing a good name may affect its "fate", not only people and cars. A few days ago, FAW Toyota ALLION officially named the new car Asian Lion in Chinese. It is worth noting that the car is full of twists and turns in its name. at the beginning of its debut, the new car was named "Aolan", but it was renamed for various reasons, which is simply rare in history.

According to the latest promotional map released by FAW Toyota, the new car has been renamed "Asian Lion" from the original "Aolan". The new car is based on the Corolla model under the TNGA architecture, and because it is an extended special model with an additional 50mm wheelbase than the Carola, it is positioned between the Carola and the Asian Dragon, in order to make up for the gap in Toyota's A + class sedan field. The new car is expected to go on sale on March 29.

FAW Toyota ALLION has attracted a lot of market attention since its launch, but also because of the controversial naming of the car. During last year's Guangzhou auto show, a promotional map about the FAW Toyota ALLION was exposed, while the word "Aolan" appeared on the new promotional map, meaning that the new car will be named and is synonymous with the English name "ALLION".

After the new car was named "Aolan", netizens were instantly uneasy, especially many netizens from Guangdong left messages saying: this name must not sell well in Chaoshan area of Guangdong. The reason is that in Chaoshan dialect, arrogance means bad and bad, and the meaning of "Lan" is not good in Chaoshan dialect, so the name of "Aolan" immediately left a deep impression on the Cantonese and was complained by everyone.

After a period of ferment of public opinion, FAW Toyota changed the Chinese name of the product and named the Asian lion in order to take care of the mood of users, which caused the naming to break the previous naming system of FAW Toyota. However, this is also because there is already an Asian dragon under FAW Toyota, so the list of Asian lions can not only make it easier for consumers to remember, but also satisfy the family brand.

At the same time, because the word ALLION contains the meaning of "LION" lion, when the official notice picture was released earlier, some netizens speculated that the car would be named Asian Lion, which was based on the same door model Asian Dragon and "LION Lion", which made netizens say: "I wish I had used this name earlier."

Although the naming of the ALLION has undergone twists and turns, the renaming of FAW Toyota models also reflects the importance Toyota attaches to the controversy.

In fact, Toyota's ALLION model, which has long been on Toyota's website, was originally not a domestic model, but a compact sedan based in Japan, which was launched in 2001. Although the car is not listed in China, you may be familiar with it. Zhongtai Z300 was launched by Zhongtai Motor in 2012, and its shape is basically the same as that of the ALLION. In 2014, sales reached 58000, more than those sold in Japan.

It was not until 2018 that Toyota registered the "ALLION" trademark in China and officially opened the layout of ALLION models. And there are rumors that the ALLION is a blockbuster car that was "hand-picked" by Akio Toyoda before it was launched in advance in the Chinese market, which is a long wheelbase to cater to Chinese consumers.

In any case, with the arrival of ALLION, Toyota will not only fill the gap in the A+ market and expand the lineup of TNGA products, but also bring new sales growth to Toyota. Toyota sold 189500 vehicles in China in January, up 30.4% from a year earlier, according to data. Among them, FAW Toyota had 84000 vehicles, up 9 per cent from the same period last year.

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