While Ferrari’s boss, Sergio Marchionne, infamously quoted that someone needs to put a bullet into his head if there’s any chance of an SUV with a Prancing horse logo at the front, Maserati thinks otherwise. With that, Maserati joins premium carmakers like Bentley, Lamborghini and Porsche – all of which have an SUV in their respective portfolio.
The official images suggest that the Levante will have a bigger front grille than usual, complemented with sleek LED headlights, along with subtle shoulder lines that arches more pronouncedly towards the back. If your eyes follow, you’ll spot a spoiler, stubby shark fin antenna, LED tail lamps and quad exhausts. It’s generally a beautiful SUV, but some angles reveal slight hints of an outgoing SUV.
The Levante will be offered with two petrol engines and a diesel engine, one of which is the familiar 3.0-litre V6 petrol engine that powers the Ghibli and Quattroporte models. However, Maserati will offer this engine in two states of tunes – the Levante 350 and Levante 430 – numbers which suggest their power. The 350 is claimed to hit 0 to 100km/h in 6.3 seconds before maxing out at 241km/h, whereas the 430 does the same in 5.2 seconds with a top speed of 262km/h.
The oil burner variant is also a 3.0-litre turbodiesel V6, and we can expect Maserati to offer a high performing variant with a petrol V8. All variants will be offered with an eight-speed automatic gearbox, sending drive to all four wheels via the company’s Q4 all-wheel-drive system. At press time, no interior pictures have been released yet.
The Maserati Levante is scheduled for its worldwide debut in about a week at the Geneva Motor Show. This Trident-bearing Italian SUV will definitely attract a new pool of customers to the brand, so expect Naza Italia, the official distributor of Maserati cars in Malaysia, to introduce this car soon.
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