The next Mitsubishi ASX will be entitled to the "Evo" name if it achieves sufficient success

Mitsubishi continues to outline the future that awaits the Evolution line with small pieces of information dropped by its senior executives. The Japanese manufacturer remains convinced that the next model offered to the public will feature a hybrid propulsion system and take the form of an SUV, as Kanenori Okamoto, Mitsubishi’s product manager, pointed out last year.

The British magazine Autocar, which obtained these words from the executive in September 2014, has once again gathered additional clues about that future “Evo”. The publication recently spoke with Mitsubishi’s president and sales director, Tetsuro Aikawa, and from his statements it emerges that this SUV, should it finally be launched, will be based on the second generation of the ASX, previewed by the XR-PHEV II prototype that we saw at Geneva.

Aikawa expressed the Japanese brand’s desire to make this product the ultimate vehicle with these characteristics. From his perspective, that responsibility stems from the very name “Evo”: the letters E and V correspond to the initials of electric vehicle in English, while the pronunciation of the second vowel resembles that of the word for king in Japanese.

The executive of Mitsubishi warned, however, that this project entails high costs for development and production, so its conception will be subject to the sales pace achieved by the new ASX, whose launch is scheduled for 2016. If the next generation delivers good commercial results, the company will seriously consider creating that version.

Should it receive the green light, this potential ASX Evolution will not go on sale one or two years later; instead, Aikawa predicted a possible reveal “in the distant future“. In other words: it will arrive long after the plug-in hybrid variant is available, the only novelty confirmed so far for the second generation of the ASX.

Aikawa added that the next model to which Mitsubishi attributes this name must be something “fast and light“. Autocar clarifies in this regard that the dreamed-of ASX Evolution would opt for a four-wheel drive system instead of the front-wheel drive of the XR-PHEV II. Its technology would take advantage of ideas learned from the i-MiEV Evolution that has competed in the Pikes Peak hill climb and would represent a way of giving more fame and prestige to Mitsubishi’s range of electric and hybrid models.

Via | Autocar

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CrossoverMitsubishi ASX8 versions · from 25,250 €