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Rover We Go Mgs May Be Back in USA After 20 Years
Sunday Mercury
PAUL MALLEY July 09, 2001
SPORTS car legend MG has moved into first gear in its surge towards
the lucrative North
American market, the Sunday Mercury can reveal today.
Birmingham-based MG Rover sent three of its sporty models to a motor
show in the USA
last week.
Company chiefs are now analysing the response to the sales initiative
- prompting renewed
speculation that MGs will soon be on their way back across the
Atlantic after a break of 20
years.
A key factor in the move is last month's take-over of the US- Italian
Qvale Automotive
Group which could accelerate MG Rover's invasion.
The models shipped to the US were the top of the range MG ZT (on sale
in the UK later
this month), a ZT-T estate (available here from September) and an MGF
roadster, which is
already well-established on the market.
The trio were on view in Minnesota at '2001: An MG Odyssey' - a huge
spectacle
organised every five years by the MG Council of North America.
An MG Rover spokesman said: 'We decided to let the Minnesota show have
access to
our vehicles as part of our look at re-entering the American market.
'It is a good way of testing the public reaction to our models. It is
all part of the analysis of
future markets. We are now waiting to hear what they think.'
In the past two decades, MG enthusiasts in the United States have been
forced to take the
costly option of importing MGs individually.
Richard Miller, of the New Jersey-based MG Drivers' Club, said: 'We
have been starved
of MGs since the 1980s and we are very hopeful that they are coming
back over here.
'The team at MG Rover has done a fantastic jobs with the new models.'
The Qvale group produces the Mangusta - a hand-built, four-litre, V8
155 mph monster -
in the north Italian city of Modena, which is also the home of Ferrari
and Maserati.
Historic ties
MG Rover intends to use the Qvale chassis and engine as the platform
to build its
proposed Super MG.
The Qvale group's founder - Norwegian-descended American Kjell Qvale -
has strong
historic ties with the MG marque.
In 1947, he began importing the MG TD and TC and later launched the
Sports Car Club
of America.
Mr Qvale, now in his 80s, set up British Motor Car Distributors which,
in the 60s, had
become the largest distributor of British- made cars in the US,
handling such makes as Austin
Healey, Jaguar and Lotus, as well as MG.
Last night motor industry expert Professor Kumar Bhattatharyya, of
Warwick University,
said: 'Sending cars to last week's show in Minnesota is a significant,
and most welcome,
development.
'MG Rover is doing well in promoting its models and exposing them to
the widest possible
market.
'There has always been a demand for UK and continental European sports
cars in the US
because American manufacturers don't produce stylish sports cars.
'I am confident that MG Rover will do extremely well in the US market
if they decide to go
into it in earnest.
'Most sensible people realise MG Rover still has an uphill struggle
but I am not one of the
pessimists who believes it cannot succeed. It has developed, and is
continuing to develop, a
good range of models.'
The Mercury road-tests the new MG range
(C) 2001 Sunday Mercury. via ProQuest Information and Learning
Company; All Rights
Reserved
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--
Andrew Lundgren
lundgren@byu.net
http://www.itwest.net/~lundgren
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