It's all change at Mitsubishi. The Japanese manufacturer is taking a new direction and promises progeny that will be stylish, sexy and alluring.
Mitsubishi is going to become a niche manufacturer - but with a volume emphasis - that will have greater appeal to the young and upwardly mobile. It's goodbye to the bland-but-competent approach that has characterised the company's car business for a long time.
We learned about the new beginning on a remote test track in France testing the CZ2 and CZ3 concepts. The CZ2 is set to translate into real flesh and bones by 2004.
"Our new global design team looked beyond the basics, to make this car look like nothing else, to give it a look of its own," says Mitsubishi's public affairs man, Daniel Nacass. "It's a casual and chic urban compact that radiates flair and spirit inside and out."
Mitsubishi has endured the same sort of metamorphosis as Nissan. Both Japanese companies had mounting debts and Europeans came to the rescue. In the Nissan case, it was Renault. With Mitsubishi, the saviour has been DaimlerChrysler. A common chord to both was a distinct lack of style or design. Customers wanted something more than good engineering and reliability: that something was style and personality.
The DaimlerChrysler influence manifests itself through people like Olivier Boulay who heads Mitsubishi's design office. A Frenchman, he latterly worked in Germany with DaimlerChrysler.
He is set to make lots of changes - and not just in the way Mitsubishi vehicles look and feel. For instance, the three-diamond logo is probably one of the most famous in the corporate culture of Japan. On future Mitsubishis, it's going to be bigger and bolder.
Mitsubishi has languished in public perception, admits Daniel Nacass. "Yet we have been consistently winning the Dakar rally with the Pajero and our Evo is one of the most desirable cars ever built. We have our engineering excellence." So where might Mitsubishi be repositioned? "I think we would like to see ourselves as Sony, a famous Japanese brand with fine products. Sony is upmarket but popular and we want to be the same."
The concept car that becomes real, the CZ2, will be produced from 2004 at the NedCar plant at Born in the Netherlands. A four-seater Smart city car is also going to be on the NedCar production line because it is also based on the CZ2 platform.
What of CZ2 anyway? A long wheelbase and upright seating positions, no floor console and a front bench seat that takes advantage of the consequent space gain, a roof with four partitions for each of the four occupants: these are some of the features.
But the real impact comes in the looks. CZ2 in designer speak is a "single motion silhouette" with lines that flow from front to rear.
CZ3 is further away from production. It also comes with the Tarmac appellation. Sharing the same platform as the CZ2, it's a sort of roadgoing rally car. According to Mitsubishi, "bold rally-bred elements were mixed with high-tech sophistication to carry occupants into a world of rally-born excitement".
Even though the real breakthrough won't happen until 2004 with CZ2 in production, Mitsubishi will be making some news before then. A facelifted Space Star, also built at Born, is due to debut here later this year and a new stylish 4x4, Airtrak, will be on Irish sale in 2003.
Olivier Boulay says Mitsubishi is all set to express itself through new shapes and forms that will be sporty and demand attention: "That's going to be our new identity."