DS Brand Could Spearhead PSA's American Revival

Derek Kreindler
by Derek Kreindler

The long-awaited return of Peugeot Citroen to North America could be in the form of their new premium DS brand, but don’t get your hopes up just yet.

Automotive News is reporting that the DS brand has ambitions to become a global premium brand – and according to DS brand CEO Yves Bonnefort, “and you cannot be global without the U.S.”

Bonnefort said that a decision wouldn’t be made until 2017, with sales not commencing until after 2020. Presumably, this would give PSA a chance to develop U.S. compliant models. DS models are currently based off of existing Citroen products, largely front-drive based smaller cars and crossovers.

Launching a new brand, and a premium one at that, is an incredibly expensive endeavor – figure about $1 billion by the time all is said and done. Whether it’s worth it for PSA to try and launch a premium brand in a mature market that has traditionally not taken to French cars is a matter that they’ll have to decide for themselves. Not long ago, PSA seemed to be on the ropes. Concentrating on their core business (mainstream cars) in their traditional markets (France and the developing economies of Africa, Asia and other European nations) might serve them better than a vanity project such as this.

Derek Kreindler
Derek Kreindler

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  • Beerboy12 Beerboy12 on Oct 06, 2014

    It think that if PSA does bring their brands over to the US, they would not fail due to their products. The products don't have Japanese levels of perceived reliability but they do have good attributes. I don't believe the US car market is brand saturated either, not even close. These cars would be some fresh air in an otherwise fairly uninteresting car landscape. Mostly dull, medium sized sedans where the only interesting cars are MINI's, Fiat 500's and Ford Mustang + competitors. I hope it happens. I would get me that 208 GTi.

  • Turvo Turvo on Oct 06, 2014

    At first glance that car in the pic looks like my wife's 13 Optima.

  • Matador Matador on Oct 07, 2014

    And, people will buy one of these over an Audi/BMW/Lexus/Mercedes why??? They're doomed.

    • Lorenzo Lorenzo on Oct 09, 2014

      So they won't look like the herd in Audi/BMW/Lexus/Mercedes. Do you realize how much the people who can afford premium cars want to stick out from the crowd, especially the crowd of others who can afford premium cars?

  • Mechaman Mechaman on Oct 07, 2014

    At least it's a prettier steal off the Fusionesque Sonata/Legacy. Less obvious too, but I think the market is already too saturated as it is here in the States .. and no one with a lick of sense will try a Yugo experiment again. Not here.

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