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The Fiat CEO, Sergio Marchionne, recently announced that Maserati will soon launch no less than three new models. "Maserati will increase its volumes by having three cars", said Marchionne after the CBI conference in London last week. According to British publication Car Magazine, Marchionne said that these would be the Kubang SUV, the Quattroporte replacement and a smaller four-door sedan that will compete in the E-segment against the likes of the Jaguar XF, BMW 5 Series and Mercedes Benz E-Class. Marchionne also confirmed that the donor architecture for the smaller sedan is the Chrysler 300, but the suspension is completely different and the engines are totally Ferrari/Maserati. Fiat has 53.5 percent stake in Chrysler Group. He added that Maserati would remain, for the biggest part, an Italian carmaker. "Apart from the Kubang, the big saloons will stay in Italy. There is a site in Modena that makes the Quattroporte. There's some debate to what happens to that plant after the Quattroporte. There is sufficient commonality in what we

Fiat's taking over of Chrysler has given fruit to a new Maserati. The Maserati Kubang SUV concept is production ready and it will be the luxury brand's foray into the luxury SUV market. One which is populated by the Porsche Cayenne, Range Rovers and other large SUVs that are full of leather, wood, 22 inch wheels that their owners hardly take off-road. Anyway, the issue is that the underpinnings of this luxury SUV will come from a Jeep Grand Cherokee. Is that something sacrilegious? To base a Maserati on a run of the mill American SUV? I suppose it is as Maserati will put it into production regardless of whether we think it is sacrilegious or otherwise. I suppose only the basic underpinnings will be used as according to the press release Maserati claims that everything else; the engine, steering, drivetrain, suspension, exterior and interior styling will be purely Maserati. The still unspecified engine will come from Maranello and will be coupled with an eight-speed automatic transmission. As a result Maserati claims that the end product is "100% Maserati". I suppose it would be a Maserati. Like any Italian supercar or in this case an Italian SUV, the essence of any Italian supercar is in the engine and an engine manufactured in Maranello, home of Ferrari is truly Italian. If this new Maserati Kubang sounds as glorious as the Gran Turismo or the Quattroporte, no one will care whether or not the Kubang is based on a lowly Jeep Grand Cherokee.