Believe it or not, the ageing Fiat Linea sedan is still being built in developing markets in Europe and Latin America. Fiat clearly believes that the budget sedan is still important, and has been hard at work developing a successor, as seen here in these photos from our European spy photographers.
Despite being heavily camouflaged, the new sedan appears to take on a more rounded look as seen on the Dodge Dart and its Fiat Viaggio sibling. At the front are headlights that look like they’ve come off the F30 BMW 3 Series, while the P-shaped tail lights are not unlike those seen on the Subaru WRX/WRX STI.
More interesting stuff goes on under the skin – the Linea’s successor will reportedly be based on the next-gen Bravo hatch, as well as an estate variant that will replace the old Stilo MultiWagon, discontinued in 2008.
Confusingly, the Bravo siblings are expected to move off the C-platform employed by the current hatch (and the Stilo) to sit on the 500L/500X/Jeep Renegade‘s stretched Small platform (which underpins the current Linea!), dubbed Small Wide. Perhaps Fiat believes that the more advanced Compact platform (a development of the C-platform, used on the Dart and Alfa Romeo Giulietta) would be too expensive to build a budget car on.
Under the hood, the cars are expected to feature engines and gearboxes lifted from the 500L and 500X. On the diesel side, the 1.3 and 1.6 litre MultiJet II engines should feature, while petrol choices could be limited to the 1.4 litre turbocharged MultiAir mill.
Fiat has reportedly invested US$1 billion on the Bravo triplets, spending US$520 million to build 580,000 units of the new sedan and the rest of it to build 700,000 units of the hatch and estate variants combined. The cars will be built by the company’s Turkish joint venture, Tofas, at its plant in Bursa over a seven-year period from 2016 to 2023.
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Rear lamp like Persona, out of ideas?