The natural course of development predicted for the upcoming Maserati Levante SUV to be no more than a glorified and dressed up Jeep Grand Cherokee that would have, undoubtedly, made a lot of financial sense for the new Fiat-Chrysler group.
However, two new reports from Motortrend magazine and CNN go hand in hand and point to the actual underpinnings to be used for the Levante, which it will share with the Quattroporte and Ghibli.
This is very welcome news, since the Jeep Grand Cherokee is not regarded as a rewarding vehicle to drive, or one that handles in any kind of remarkable way, and these are two traits that simply must be present in a Maserati product.
They would have to mirror Porsche’s Cayenne recipe, but build it around their brand’s own values; the sedan-based architecture will help it achieve that much more than the unwieldy Jeep chassis ever could.
The company is still saying it will stick to its Jeep plans, when asked officially, but the project has been marked by setbacks and direction changes before, so it may hold true. The sedan solution suggestion is also strengthened by the automaker’s recent announcement that it was going to build the Levante in Italy, and not in the US, where it would have been made alongside the Dodge Durango and Jeep Grand Cherokee.
By Andrei Nedelea
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