Fiat-Chrysler to borrow Mitsubishi’s Mirage based Attrage sedan for emerging markets

Italian automaker Fiat wants to expand its presence in Asian car markets and plans to take the badge engineering route to do just this. Mitsubishi’s Attrage sedan, which is based on the Mirage hatchback platform, will be central to Fiat’s badge engineering strategy for Asian car markets that includes China.

While initial details suggest that Fiat will contract Mitsubishi to build the Attrage sedan with Chrysler badging for Asian markets, the exact nature of this agreement will be revealed in the coming weeks. Notably, Fiat now owns American automaker Chrysler, and a bevy of brands associated with the American automaker.

The Mitsubishi Attrage is a compact sedan variant of the Mirage hatchback. The car features a 1.2 liter-3 cylinder, variable valve timing equipped petrol engine that outputs 78 Bhp of peak power and 100 Nm of peak torque. Transmission duties are handled by either a 5 speed manual gearbox or a CVT automatic gearbox with INVECS-III adaptive shifting technology.

The Attrage is already sold in many parts of South East Asia as Mitsubishi’s entry level sedan meant for fuel efficiency conscious buyers. Talking of fuel efficiency, Mitsubishi claims a mileage of 21 Kmpl for Attrage, which weighs a light 905 kilograms. After badge engineering, the car will be the least priced sedan sold under the Chrysler badge.

Although Fiat does have the Linea sedan that can be offered to Chrysler for badge engineering, the automaker seems to be favouring a more fuel efficient car, which could be the reason behind the decision to source the Attrage from Japanese automaker Mitsubishi.

As of now, there are no plans of Chrysler entering the Indian car market with the Attrage sedan. However, a car such as the Attrage could do it bit to bring in the big numbers for Fiat India, in the compact sedan segment. What say, Fiat India?

Via Reuters