Through much of the last decade, Renault’s product lineup lived up to the long-standing French reputation for peculiar design. This was particularly true of its flagship model, the bizarre looking five-door hatchback Vel Satis. That unsuccessful model is now set to be replaced by a much more conventional looking four-door sedan dubbed the Latitude.
The Latitude is built on a stretched version of the mid-sized Laguna platform and shares its powertrain options, including the new 3.0-liter diesel V6. Most of the car is common with the Renault-Samsung SM5 sedan that went on sale in South Korea recently and he new sedan spans an additional 1.2 inches bumper to bumper than the Vel Satis, while sitting four inches lower.
The public will get its first opportunity to see the Latitude in person at the Moscow Motor Show and then again at the Paris Motor Show in September before it goes on sale in North Africa, Asia, Australia and Eastern Europe this fall. Western Europeans will have to wait until early next year to get the Latitude.