Despite its weak sales partly due to consumption habits that value SUVs and crossovers, the Mazda6 was an excellent car. Its production, which ended last July, undeniably left a hole in the range of a Japanese manufacturer traditionally associated with cars much more than SUVs. Some clung to the hope of a return in a more opulent form by means of a new platform. Alas, this will not be the case, for the moment.
Posted at 11:45 a.m.
Joachim Kunz, engineering director of the manufacturer’s European subsidiary, confirmed in an interview with the English magazine Coach that the project will ultimately not see the light of day in the short term. “It would be really nice to have a front-engine, rear-wheel-drive formula with a six-cylinder for the successor to the Mazda6 or for a large coupe. We would like to have it, but the most important right now is to sell SUVs,” he said.
Rumors of a rear-drive Mazda6 date back a few years and were a natural fit with the brand’s gentrification strategy. The new chassis with longitudinal mechanics was inaugurated a few weeks ago with the unveiling of the CX-60, a compact SUV that will not be offered in North America. Mazda prefers to offer the CX-70 and CX-80 models which have two and three rows of seats respectively and which have been adapted to the market. They haven’t been introduced yet.
Will the Mazda6 ever return? Difficult to say in a context where the sedan suffers from such great disaffection. One thing is certain, if Mazda dares to revive this car, it will be interesting to see its positioning in an arena dominated by the Germans and, above all, its performance.