GM's Pulling the Trigger on the Cadillac Escala, Report Claims

It’s hard to fathom, given the industry’s (and the public’s) addiction to utilities, but a new report claims Cadillac aims to start production on a new flagship car in late 2021. Not just any car, either, but a model with a name taken from a high-profile concept vehicle: Escala.

You’ll remember the Escala as a trim, pillarless, four-door liftback with classic rear-drive proportions, introduced at the 2016 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance. At the time, Cadillac president Johan de Nysschen called the concept a “potential addition” to the brand’s product lineup, but with the CT6 just beginning to roll out of dealers — and in the wake of the earlier, futureless Ciel and Elmiraj concepts — few got their hopes up.

The report comes by way of Autoline Daily, sourcing its information from auto industry data provider AutoForecast Solutions.

A vehicle called the Escala will go into production at General Motors’ Detroit/Hamtramck Assembly plant in December of 2021, the source material claims, without specifying a bodystyle. Currently, the Hamtramck facility builds the Buick LaCrosse, Chevrolet Volt, Chevrolet Impala, and Cadillac CT6 — when the lights are on, anyways. Falling sedan sales, especially those of full-size models, has led to lengthy periods of downtime.

The new vehicle, be it a large coupe (dare we dream), sedan, or something else, would borrow its architecture from the CT6.

Late 2021 isn’t far away in strategic terms, but given the rapid decline of the passenger car market, we have to wonder how many traditional two- and four-doors cars will still exist at that point. Cadillac’s currently fielding as many crossovers as it can to satisfy growing demand for utilities in the premium field. A compact XT4 joins the midsize XT5 for 2019. In the sedan realm, a duo of new models — the CT4 and CT5 — replaces the ATS, CTS, and XTS by the end of the decade.

If the Escala does come to fruition, expect a technology-packed model with some form of electrification built into its powertrain. Whether or not the brand goes ultra-lux/halo with this one remains to be seen.

Cadillac brand sales rose 14 percent in February, with volume up 5.3 percent over the first two months of 2018. Lending some doubt to the Escala report is the fact that U.S. CT6 sales haven’t touched the four-figure mark since June of last year, and growth over the past two months is just 2.6 percent above the same period last year. While that’s a better direction than the opposite, the segment’s overall trajectory points nowhere but down.

[Images: General Motors]