This is a sketch of a design, so don’t expect the final product to look as aggressive.
The Nivus small crossover was not the only model that Volkswagen teased at the Annual Media Conference. A sketch of the second-generation Amarok was also shown. When Herbert Diess announced that the Amarok would be the first fruit of the partnership between Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles (VW) and Ford, the adjacent image was displayed in the background.
In January 2019, the two companies announced plans to form a global alliance to work together on commercial vans, pickups, and other vehicles. The second-generation Amarok will be sharing many of its parts with the new Ranger, once the mid-size trucks go on sale later in the decade. The announcement by the two marques just over a year back suggests that the pickups will be available as soon as 2022.
Although the design sketch shows a strong look for the Amarok overhaul, we don’t expect the actual thing to be as aggressive. We suspect that automakers tend to exaggerate details in their sketches. This sketch is no exception. The truck has a large hood, huge wheels, big off-road tires and no handles. This is a teaser that’s a lot more eye-catching than the actual model. However, it should give us an idea of what we can expect from the truck.
The exterior design for the Amarok’s sister-model, the Amarok II, has been fully revealed if the leaked images of February 2019 are accurate. The next Ford Ranger featured a bold front fascia that merged the grille with the headlights, much like the German truck. The pickup was designed to be a double-cab, but the VW sketch shows it with only two doors.
The collaboration between the automakers could lead to a new Ford Transit Connect, based on the 2020 VW Caddy. In the global alliance announcement, VW was to develop a Ford-badged city van and the Blue Oval would be developing larger commercial vans.