Skeptics Doubt Reports Fiat Investing €1.5 Billion in Maserati SUV Output

TURIN, Italy – The Italian auto industry is skeptical about widespread media reports Fiat Group plans to invest between €1 billion and €1.5 billion ($1.3 billion-$2.0 billion) at its Mirafiori industrial complex for the production of the anticipated Maserati Levante SUV, and possibly an all-new Alfa Romeo SUV or sport sedan.

Insiders say there is no need for another factory to reach the highly optimistic production (and sales) volume of 50,000 Maserati SUVs annually that the auto maker reportedly expects by 2016.

They also wonder how Fiat Group can afford to make such a risky investment when it is cutting costs elsewhere everything, including delaying development of vital products such as the Punto and Mito range.

The auto maker would have to sell a lot of high-cost Maseratis and Alfa Romeos to recoup such a large investment as well as reap some profits, insiders say.

If taking Maserati to the Olympus of premium automobiles requires €1.5 billion, then how much would Fiat need to spend to re-launch Alfa Romeo and sell 300,000 units annually with current demand so anaemic?

There doesn’t seem to be a convincing answer.

Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne has suggested the Mirafiori plant would be refurbished for volume production of a new pair of SUVs for Chrysler and Alfa Romeo. However, the news was not well received by workers in Detroit.

Fiat and Chrysler then talked about developing a Maserati SUV that would be built in Detroit. That plan was dropped when it became obvious the Jefferson North Assembly Plant delivering the Grand Cherokee was too highly automated to allow production of a labor-intensive luxury SUV that would sell in small volumes of about 25,000 units annually.

After intense commuting between Turin, Maserati headquarters in Modena and Chrysler in Detroit, Fiat and Maserati decision makers came to the conclusion the promised luxury SUV could not be engineered and built in Detroit and still be sold as an Italian exotic.

They did not believe the Jeep Grand Cherokee’s platform could provide the performance and credibility of a Maserati, even if the architecture originated from monocoque underpinnings of the Mercedes-Benz's ML.

The latest word from Turin and Modena is the Maserati SUV is back on the drawing board, with designers and engineers tasked with creating the vehicle from the Quattroporte platform. The unveiling of the Jaguar C-X17 SUV at last week’s Frankfurt auto show likely played a major role in this most recent decision.

The Maserati SUV’s new start means enthusiasts eager to take delivery of the Levante in 2014, as previously announced, now will have to wait until 2016 at the earliest.

Indeed, the idea of a Maserati SUV is now 10 years old. The first vision of a Maserati utility vehicle range was in 2003 when Giorgetto Giugiaro of Italdesign proposed the Kubang as the new GT Wagon architecture to great acclaim.

Maserati designers presented their own interpretation of the formula two years ago at Frankfurt. Despite some critics who thought Maserati should have kept the Giugiaro design, the show car appealed to the buying public and got the green light with the new name of the Maserati Levante.