Developing new vehicles is an expensive business, especially when that vehicle is an SUV and you’ve never built one before. That’s the position of Jaguar, which says it still hasn’t decided if it will develop its C-X17 prototype into a sellable model.
Why build an SUV at all?
Building a sports utility vehicle may not seem like Jaguar territory, famed as the Crewe-based marque is for luxury saloons and the odd sports car. But that hasn’t stopped Porsche, BMW and even Bentley from batting their eyelashes at would-be SUV buyers.
In short, SUVs are big money. In the UK alone the market has increased an amazing 45 per cent year-on-year. That might be reason enough to build such a vehicle, but when you understand the burgeoning demand for SUVs from India and China, not building an SUV is simply throwing money away.
A reporter from the Daily Telegraph recently got invited to a test drive event for the C-X17 in Dubai, and seemed impressed by the attention to detail of the new car. Of course, a vehicle that is so early-on in its development was never going to impress in terms of ride quality – and this one did not – but the overall subtlety of design and build quality was applauded, especially when compared with the likes of Bentley’s ostentatious effort.
Looking at the sales figures for Range Rover’s Evoque and Porsche’s Cayenne models, one wonders why Jaguar didn’t start building an SUV much sooner.
One also wonders if having a sister company that basically invented the off-roader – Land Rover – will benefit the new Jag at all. If Jaguar Cars Ltd. does get help from its Tata-owned sibling, then it has a great chance of making a superb SUV, and not one that will have owners calling their breakdown cover provider too often.
Breakdown Cover from 
