Bentley Looking To Shake Up The Luxury SUV Market Segment
$VLKAY, $F, $GM, $FCAU
The Frankfurt Motor Show opened to the public last Saturday, and a big stories there is the introduction of a super-luxury sport utility vehicle (SUV) from Bentley Motors, Ltd. a unit of volkswagen AG (OTCMKT:VLKAY)
The Bentayga is expected to have a base sticker price of $229,100 in the United States, and options could 2X that total.
For Cadillac Escalade maker General Motors Co. (NYSE:GM) and other luxury SUV makers, like Mercedes, Porsche and Land Rover, the new Bentayga raises the top end of a price range that currently at around $150,000. An Escalade complete with every feature on GM’s list runs about $95,000.
The Mercedes-Benz G63 AMG SUV carries a sticker price of just over $137,000 for a vehicle that has pretty much the same body style it debuted with in Y 1979.
In a report Monday at Automotive News, Mercedes-Benz’s SUV boss said that the company is “looking at everything that is going on in that segment,” but stopped short of saying the company has made a decision on whether to proceed.
For GM and Cadillac, the Big Q is: Does the company stick with the Escalade name and just add some letters and numbers that sound more luxurious, or do they come up with a new brand and new design?
And what about Ford Motor Co. (NYSE:F) and its Lincoln Navigator?
This SUV’s success might be attributed to its relatively low price for a luxury vehicle. Its base price is about $62,000 lower than the Escalade’s base price of around $72,000, and less than 50% the base price of the Bentley.
Seeing either Ford or GM in the super-luxury SUV sector is hard to imagine. What makes more sense is raising the top end of the current models’ price ranges and, perhaps, adorning the vehicle with a distinctive badge and some additional luxury options.
It is not difficult to imagine an Escalade with a base price of around $100,000 and options that could add another $50,000. The same is true for the Lincoln Navigator.
The 1st Bentayga is scheduled for delivery to Queen Elizabeth II at the end of this year.
Ferrari says under no conditions, ever will it present an SUV.
| Symbol | Last Trade | Date | Change | Open | High | Low | Volume |
| OTCMKT:VLKAY | 25.24 | 22 Sept-2015 | -4.86 | 25.26 | 25.73 | 24.4 | 8,596,614 |
| HeffX-LTN Analysis for VLKAY: | Overall | Short | Intermediate | Long |
| Bearish (-0.33) | Neutral (-0.00) | Very Bearish (-0.54) | Bearish (-0.46) |
Stay tuned…
HeffX-LTN
Paul Ebeling
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