Just because Italdesign has been subsumed into the
Volkswagen Group doesn’t mean it can’t still design cars for other automakers.
In fact, the design house has just won a tender from VinFast.
The Vietnamese startup held an open contest to see who’d
design its new line of vehicles. Just last month, Pininfarina announced that it
had won the contract to design a sedan and SUV for the company, and now,
Italdesign has claimed the prize for two city cars.
Little in the way of details have been disclosed to
go with these design sketches, but we do know that one of the models will be
conventionally powered by an internal-combustion engine, and that the other
will be fully electric. Both are slated “to be produced within next years.”
The design house founded by Giorgetto Giuriaro also
notes that it won an earlier round of the contest to design a sedan and SUV for
VinFast. Given that Pininfarina claims the same, we gather that it plans to make two
sedans and two SUVs – one each designed by the two Italian studios – to go with
the two city cars.
Once dependent largely on Russian imports, Vietnam
aims to step up its domestic auto industry. The VinFast initiative aims to
become Southeast Asia’s leading car manufacturer, with plans to produce
numerous vehicles with both conventional and electric powertrains.
