About time Jeep got with the program.
Jeep has thus far not really been playing to the trends of the conventional market players, proudly continuing to shoehorn large petrol engines into most of its off-roaders with the exception of the Fiat-sourced Renegade and the related India-made Compass.
The latest exemplar of this operational and product philosophy being the 527kW Grand Cherokee Trackhawk, powered by the same 6.2-litre supercharged HEMI V8 as in their sister company Dodge’s Challenger SRT Hellcat.
Perhaps to offset their guzzling ways, Jeep is planning on unveiling something radical at the upcoming Shanghai Motor Show. Not as dramatic as a family sedan, say, but rather the first glimpses of what could be their first plug-in hybrid.
Called the Yuntu, the SUV concept bears all the same design elements as the larger Jeeps of today, albeit with more aggressive exterior overtones and exaggerations in places. As famously polluted as Shanghai’s air is (as well as other major cities there), the Chinese government have introduced measures to leave no room for new cars that do not conform to strict emissions and fuel efficiency regulations under penalty of crippling taxes and charges.
This, naturally, is barring Jeep from tapping into the burgeoning and lucrative SUV market in China, where companies such as BMW, Audi, Land Rover, and even Porsche have been cashing in on the demand for high riding practical runabouts there. To get into the game, Jeep has to tread out of its comfort zone and play the electrification game.
While there aren’t any initial details about what exactly could be living under that rugged but elegant skin, we are fans of this SUV looks. Even when watered down for mass production, the Yuntu could still be the most modern looking Jeep to date - and by a considerable margin.
But to really square up their SUV offensive against some really hard hitting competition, Jeep has to find some new inspiration when it comes to their interiors. A preview that Jeep hasn’t yet released, unfortunately. Speaking of which, the cabin on the concept is accessed by a pair of suicide doors that most definitely will not make it to a showroom model.
It’s possible that the Yuntu will be a seven-seater as currently the marque doesn’t have a offering with more than 5 seats, surely a useful addition to combat such SUVs such as the Land Rover Discovery, Audi Q7, Mazda CX-9, and others. That is, if and when the production Yuntu will be made available outside China as some report that Jeep is looking to focus on that market exclusively as a locally-assembled model.
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