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According to foreign media reports, Cupra, a brand of Volkswagen Group, aims to sell 70, 000 Tavascan pure electric models worldwide every year. The car will be manufactured at Volkswagen's joint venture plant in Anhui and exported to Europe, which will also be the first car produced by the joint venture plant. It is reported that the models that Volkswagen planned to produce in Anhui will be used exclusively for export, but the plan seems to have changed, and the Tavascan model will also be sold in the Chinese market in the future, not as a model under the Cupra brand, but with a new series that has not yet been named.

As for the reasons why Tavascan models are not launched as Cupra brands in China, officials said, "it is too expensive to build a new brand in China, so Volkswagen is more willing to launch new sub-brands for Volkswagen brands, but at present, Volkswagen has not identified a new sub-brand name, but whether the new sub-brands can be accepted by Chinese consumers is particularly important.

On April 23rd, Cupra released official pictures of its new model, the Tavascan. It is understood that the model is based on the Volkswagen MEB platform, positioned as a sedan SUV, using a unique and sporty design language.

As a model built on the MEB platform, the Cupra Tavascan can be regarded as a sister to products such as the Volkswagen ID.5 or Skoda Enyaq Coupe iV. However, compared with the above models, the Cupra Tavascan adopts a relatively radical design style, with a number of wide diversion grooves around the front of the new car and integrated black strips inside. The new headlamp group uses a highly recognizable triangular light source layout, with a sharp headlight group shape and a muscular front cover, making the front part of the car more aggressive. In addition, the pre-Logo of Cupra Tavascan incorporates the LED backlight design, which can bring stronger recognition after lighting. In terms of size, the length, width and height of the car are 4644/1861/1597mm and the wheelbase is 2766mm.

On the rear side, the Cupra Tavascan uses a slippery back shape, and there is a duck-tail spoiler above the taillights. The taillight adopts the popular penetrating design, and the luminous rear Logo echoes with the design of the front. The bright black style surrounded by the rear and the shape of the diffuser make the rear look more sporty.

When entering the car, Cupra Tavascan uses a large number of arcs and special-shaped panels to create a sports atmosphere, while also decorated with rose gold and matte silver elements. However, except for the emergency flasher switch, there are almost no physical buttons on the center console, and all the functional controls are integrated in the large-size central control screen, but many physical buttons and knobs are retained on the multi-function steering wheel.

In terms of power, the new car will offer a single-motor / dual-motor version with a maximum power of 210 kilowatts and a peak torque of 545 Nm, while the dual-motor version will have a maximum power of 250 kilowatts and a peak torque of 679 Nm. The WLTP mileage of the single-motor version is 550km and the WLTP mileage of the dual-motor version is 520km.

According to reports, the Cupra Tavascan will be produced at the Volkswagen plant in Anhui and sold back to the European market. The car is expected to go on sale in 2024, and the company hopes to sell more than 70, 000 vehicles a year. According to the latest information, due to Volkswagen ID. The series does not sell well in the Chinese market, coupled with the poor performance of Skoda and Jetta, and there are no plans to introduce the Cupra brand to China, which is expected to launch a sub-brand through the Volkswagen brand to become a new model under the new series.

Anhui is the group's third automobile production base in China after Anting and Foshan plants. Unlike SAIC Volkswagen and FAW-Volkswagen, Volkswagen Anhui was formerly Jianghuai Volkswagen. At the beginning of its establishment, Volkswagen and Jianghuai Automobile each held 50% of the shares. Later, with the lifting of foreign equity restrictions, Volkswagen increased its capital to Jianghuai Volkswagen, increasing its shareholding to 75%. This means that the public has the absolute right to say.

In December 2020, Jianghuai Volkswagen Co., Ltd. changed its name to Volkswagen (Anhui) Co., Ltd. In September 2022, Volkswagen released its 2030 strategy, which explicitly mentioned that Volkswagen's next generation pure electric platform SSP will be put into production in Volkswagen Anhui. In early 2021, Volkswagen announced that it would merge MEB and PPE, with automotive electronics, software and computer systems as the core to develop a new SSP platform. In the future, Volkswagen Group will retain only SSP, a pure electric platform, which can produce Porsche and Audi and Seattle and Skoda.

Overall, Anhui appears to be playing a more central role in Volkswagen's latest "in China, for China" strategy, as Ralf Brandst ä tter, a member of the group's Chinese board, said when announcing the establishment of a new local R & D company in October. "by continuously bundling development and procurement capabilities and integrating local suppliers at an early stage, we will greatly accelerate our pace of development.

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