Zotye is Ford’s new friend in China, companies
signed a joint venture agreement to make cheap electric cars for the masses.
Ford used to own Land Rover until they sold it on to Tata in 2008. So Zotye
must have thought it was perfectly okay to ripoff the Range Rover Sport for
their new flagship T800 SUV.
The Zotye T800 will be launched on the Chinese car
market next year, powered by a 200 hp 2.0 turbo and a ±250 hp 2.0 turbo hybrid.
It will be positioned above the infamous Zotye SR9 Porsche Macan clone. The
T800 marks the first time that Zotye rips off a Land Rover. But others went
there already, most notably Landwind with the X7.
The real thing. Zotye even cloned the fake air vents
on the bonnet! The Range Rover Sport is imported into China. It sells for
751.000 yuan for the 3.0 V6 to a massive 2.3 million yuan for the 5.0 V8 SVR
(US$ 114,000 – 350,000). The 5.0 is taxed extremely hard, and is therefore far
more expensive than the 3.0 models.
The Zotye T800 will be ‘slightly’ cheaper, starting
at about 180.000 yuan or US$ 27,300. That would make it the most expensive Zotye
so far, but one would be able to buy four T800’s for the price of one Range
Rover Sport 3.0 V6. Size wise they will be close to completely similar.
This is the only pic we have of the interior of the
T800. It does not appear to be ripped off of any Land Rover product, and still
it looks somewhat familiar. The screen appears to be about 10 inches in
diameter, the vents are located below the screen, and the aircon controls below
that. The center tunnel looks rather nice with shiny black panels and shiny
silver buttons.
