Renault Wants Two New Brands To Take On Volkswagen Globally

Bertel Schmitt
by Bertel Schmitt

When Renault had rolled out its Alpine A110-50 a few weeks ago, the logical conclusion was that this was not just to celebrate the 50th birthday of Alpine. Today, Renault COO Carlos Tavares tells Bloomberg that Renault is thinking about bringing back Alpine as a brand for sports cars, and to create another high-end brand for luxury models in a bid to become a true global carmaker.

Renault can use a boost. Its five-month European deliveries dropped 19.7 percent in the EU, while the market dropped 7.7 percent. Cross-town rival PSA lost 15 percent in the period. Both French brands are disproportionately exposed to the cratering southern parts of Europe, both are much less equipped to make it up with exports as the Germans do. Says Tavares:

“We may have one day a luxury brand. That would help from a profitability standpoint because everybody’s always looking at VW and what Audi represents for the VW group.”

As for Alpine, Renault is talking to potential partners to help revive the brand and share in the development costs, Tavares said. Renault has an alliance with Nissan, and a smaller one with Daimler.

Bertel Schmitt
Bertel Schmitt

Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.

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  • Sportyaccordy Sportyaccordy on Jun 20, 2012

    This would be like Mitsubishi starting luxury + sports car brands. Who's gonna put that money up when your basics are on the rocks?

  • Stanczyk Stanczyk on Jun 20, 2012

    If they have a team in F1 formula it would be nice ... they should ... have "really-sports-car" ... They produce the hottest of the hot-hatches : CLIO RS and Megane RS (FWD - only 265 BHP - but this thing is faster on track than Nismo 370Z (fifth gear test) ... so this Alpine car'll be a fast beast ! ... But in luxury segment .. ?!? ... Citroen tried with it's elegant C6 model , but failed (right now they have "wannabe luxury" DS series)... But Renault would need to start from 0-level ( even if they would use Infiniti help...)

  • Mjz Mjz on Jun 20, 2012

    I always thought that Renault should have bought SAAB to use as their upscale European division. Both brands have a similar quirky sensibility. It would have been easier to upgrade the established SAAB image and dealer network then to start from scratch with a clean sheet of paper. They could have SAABized the various Infiniti models for the SAAB line-up. Oh well, too late now.

  • Stanczyk Stanczyk on Jun 21, 2012

    Interesting concept for Renault to take over SAAB (.. I allways thought that the best solution for SAAB would be BMW (serious company with good technoilogy, and SAAB would be a little bit cheaper, rebuild BMW's...but germans has allways have problem with "quirky factor":) [yeah .. VW Beatle was oryginaly chech car called Tatra ) ... For the first glance Renault and SAAB don't suit ... but there's that "quirky-connection/association" ...

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