It’s no longer a secret: Renault is going to clean up its range, especially on the side of large models. The Scénic and Espace minivans should not be renewed, and the same could be true for the Talisman sedan and station wagon. Instead, the Losange will highlight the future generation of the Kadjar and Koleos SUVs.
More surprisingly, the fate of the Megane also seems uncertain. It’s not just the sound of a corridor. It was Laurens van den Acker, Renault’s style director, who suggested this to Autoexpress magazine.
He stated : “Inevitably, once we start adding an electric vehicle offering to our lineup, some of the other vehicles will have to leave because we just can’t afford to develop it all at the same time.”
Laurens van den Acker added: “The Mégane is in an increasingly pressured segment. You have to put your money where the future of the market is”. Clearly, the money needed to develop a new Mégane could be more useful for developing an electric model that promises a better future. At the moment, Renault is working on two new electric SUVs, inspired by the Morphoz concept.
This is puzzling. The traditional compact segment remains one of the largest in Europe. It is hard to imagine Renault leaving it prematurely and leaving the field open to competition, even if it is true that the Mégane has seen its sales fall in recent years.
We say that Laurens van den Acker has a distant deadline in mind. There is a good chance that the Mégane will have the right to a fifth generation by 2023. But it could be the last before its replacement by an electric compact.
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