Canada is already the fifth largest market in the world for Lamborghini, and with the Urus super-SUV on its way for 2018, the Italian exotic company plans to double its sales here, said Lamborghini’s CEO Stefano Domenicali during a recent visit.
The traditionally super slinky sports car maker is preparing itself for a new era in its history, said Domenicali.
“The Urus SUV will be a game-changer for the brand,” said Domenicali.
Yet it’s not their similarly passion-fuelled Italian sports car rival’s success that Lamborghini hopes to mimic, but that of two other luxurious but sporting marques of the Volkswagen Group, specifically with the Porsche Cayenne and more recently the Bentley Bentayga. Both have found warm and profitable waters in the high-end sporting SUV segment, with Bentley pushing well upwards into the six-figure V12 SUV territory that the Lamborghini Urus will also play in, providing a winter-going rival to the Range Rover that many exotic car owners previously turned to when the weather turned nasty.
The production Urus will debut December 4th in Italy, and will offer both V8 and V12-powered models, said Domenicali, though perhaps only the V8 at launch, estimated to make about 650 hp. “The V12 is important, because it’s part of the brand’s culture and history,” said Domenicali in an interview. The ‘super sport utility’ is scheduled to launch early in 2018 in Europe, and in the third quarter in Canada (which ranks 38th in the world by population, 10th amongst OECD nations).
A plug-in hybrid version will arrive roughly a year later, he confirmed, perhaps even paired to that V12.
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