The Volkswagen Atlas Tanoak is very unlikely to hit the production line, the company has said.
While recently speaking with Autoblog, VW’s vice president of product marketing and strategy Hein Schafer said that even though the Atlas Tanoak pickup truck concept was very well received when revealed almost two years ago, the chances of it being produced are very slim.
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For starters, Schafer said it would take a lot of time and money to modify the Atlas into a pickup truck and even if perfected, the resulting product wouldn’t be as capable as a traditional body-on-frame truck. Secondly, VW believes the best it could do with an Atlas-based pickup would be to create a rival to the Honda Ridgeline but given how small the Ridgeline’s sales are, doing so wouldn’t make much sense.
Schafer added that there remains a possibility VW could create a new pickup for the U.S., perhaps a production version of the Tarok concept from last year. Such a vehicle could be based on a new subcompact crossover and be marketed more as a lifestyle vehicle so it wouldn’t have to face stiff competition in the midsize truck segment.
Chief operating officer of VW of America, Johan de Nysschen, however, doesn’t seem won over by the Tanoak nor the Tarok. In an interview with Motor Trend at the Chicago Auto Show, a VW pickup truck for the North American market “is not even on the discussion set for North America for the next five years,” he said.
If a new VW pickup were to be launched, de Nysschen believes making an all-electric one would be the best idea.
