Mercedes GT targets Porsche buyers
MERCEDES-BENZ is targeting potential Porsche buyers with a new top-of-the-line sports car that costs about half the price of its predecessor.
The Mercedes GT, which was presented this week in Affalterbach, Germany, to replace the €225,505 SLS, will start at about €100,000. That doesn’t mean Mercedes skimps on performance. The two-seater boasts more power and faster acceleration than the Porsche 911, adding zip to a brand best known for safe and comfortable sedans.
“The new GT is an important signature vehicle for Mercedes,” said Juergen Pieper, a Frankfurt-based analyst with Bankhaus Metzler. “The GT embodies the new brand image, which is a lot sportier and more dynamic.”
Mercedes wants higher volumes for the cut-rate sports car after the SLS proved too exclusive. Chief executive officer Dieter Zetsche has been rolling out edgier compacts like the CLA sedan to shake the perception that a Mercedes is an old man’s car. The strategy is focused on leapfrogging BMW and Audi to become the biggest luxury-car brand by the end of the decade after losing the top rank in 2005.
The GT abandons the SLS’s stylish, yet awkward, gull-wing doors to make it more practical. It’s also 15 centimetres shorter than its predecessor, helping reduce weight by 200 kilograms to boost performance.
Powered by a newly developed V8 engine, with internally mounted turbo chargers, the 462-horsepower GT surges to 100kmh in as little as 4 seconds. By comparison, the €90,400- base version of the 911 sports a 350-horsepower engine and can accelerate to 100 kmh in 4.4 seconds. The GT can drive as fast as 304 kmh, bested only by the top end of the 911 range. Sales of the 510-horsepower GT S variant start in October, a few months ahead of the base model.
“The goose bumps inside my eardrums took days to recede,” said reviewer Georg Kacher in a July report for Germany’s Car magazine after a test ride in a GT prototype. “The no-holds- barred ride will forever rank high on my list of great passenger-seat adventures.”
With such plaudits and its lower price, the GT is set to more than double sales of the SLS, estimates market researcher IHS Automotive. Still, with peak sales of 6,500 vehicles in 2016, it will trail the volumes of other high-end sports cars, according to IHS.
