Now, that was blazingly fast; just three days after Mercedes-Benz hosted the world premiere of their Concept Coupé SUV at the ongoing Beijing Auto Show in China, and our spies captured the first ever prototype of the car that is believed to carry the MLC designation testing in production form on the road!
Naturally, your first question will be how close or far away is the production SUV from the Beijing show concept, to which our initial response (based on what we can decipher from the camouflaged tester) is, quite close.
The shape remains the same with visible differences including the taller glasshouse, the protruding instead of shaved door handles, a bigger set of door mirrors, less aggressively styled bumpers and possibly, loftier tail lamps. Do note that Mercedes’ engineers placed a faux boot cover at the rear end of the SUV.
As it shares its underpinnings with the next M-Class, Benz’s rival to the BMW X6 crossover will be offered with a familiar gasoline and diesel engine range topped out by a turbocharged V8 edition with the AMG moniker.
Production and global sales of the MLC should start in the second half of 2015.
By John Halas
Photo Credits: CarPix for CarScoopS
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