In an effort to share development and manufacturing costs, manufacturers have been in the practice of rebadging since 1917.
Rebadging isn’t as common of a practice in China, though. New vehicles generally share platforms and drive components, but are independently styled.
Great Wall Motors is aiming to change the status quo with their ORA and WEY brands. WEY is sharing the Macchiato with Ora, while Ora is sharing its Ballet cat with WEY in this retro unnamed form.
CarNewsChina recently reported on the Ballet cat, citing its controversial not-inspired-by-the-Beetle design as the source of heated debate. While WEY’s version of the Ballet cat does depart further from the Beetle design, it remains polarizing.
A massive chrome grille is all you could see (or can’t see, depending on the position of the sun) in the front of the vehicle. This tall, upright grille design was popular with early car designs- providing more than enough space for the rumored DHT PHEV drive train.
The side profile is near-identical to the Ballet cat. An elongated roofline is a result of the 4-door design, which pushes the overall length of the vehicle to 4.8m. Chromed wire wheels are quite unique for a modern car.
From the rear, a hump provides extra space for luggage. WEY says the hump can be optioned with different modules. Design is still very similar to the Ora Ballet cat.
The strange retro-futuristic design continues on the interior. Full panel LCD screens exist in parallel with stitched-cloth seats and round air vents. Netizens have spotted similarities with current Mercedes interiors, albeit with stranger colors and materials.
At a rumored 200,000- 250,000 RMB (30,900- 38,600 USD) and with a design to make Mitsuoka proud, we wonder if WEY’s retro car will succeed on the Chinese market?
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James, by definition, this isn’t a rebadge, which generally means ONLY a badge change with minimal changes to the interior/exterior.
As compared to the ballet cat, I see here a unique exterior, unique interior, unique branding, and likely a few other changes under the hood. Thus, it doesn’t really qualify as a rebadge. You could call it a shared-platform model, or a shared-development model, but not a rebadge.
Fair point, there is a grey area here. It’s not as simple as normal rebadge exercises (eg. Monaro & Pontiac GTO), but not as detached as purely shared platform/shared engineering (VW Golf, Audi A3 & Skoda Octavia). The WEY concept uses identical body panels as that of the ORA, other than the engine compartment area.
Yes, the interior is indeed unique to each vehicle and that isn’t seen in traditional rebadges.
This vehicle is an Ora dressed up to be a WEY like the Cherry cat is a WEY dressed to be an Ora. I think the styling won’t be as one-sided if engineers only had to share the platform and engineering.
Perhaps we should give this practice a new name 🙂
I love it. I’ve been waiting for such style return since PT Cruiser! Pity it won’t arrive Europe.
Ora has big plans to make it into Europe, I wonder if they’ll take WEY with them? 🙂