Pininfarina has presented
a first teaser image of its concept car for this year's
Geneva Motor Show, a luxurious and
environmentally-friendly sports sedan, which will be
unveiled on March 6 at the Swiss Palexpo.
Dubbed
Cambiano, Pininfarina says that "it is an elegant and
refined sport sedan, conceived with great attention to
the environment, both as to the engine and as to the
materials' choice."
The eye-catching new concept will be a welcome visual
shot in the arm for Pininfarina which continues to
shrink in size and lose money according to its most
recent financial report issued on November 14, 2011.
Shorn of much of its traditional operations, last year
it lost its interest in the Pincar electric vehicle
project while somewhat optimistic hopes that Gian Mario
Rossignolo's plans to revive the De Tomaso brand which
would have provided employment for staff as well as
design and engineering work appear to have fizzled out.
According to Pininfarina: "Cambiano represents the
summit of Pininfarina skills in terms of styling and
engineering."
It
isn't clear why Pininfarina has chosen the route of a
luxury sedan as its showcase concept for the 2012 Geneva
Motor Show, however it could be that this concept is
actually the 'sedan' offering from the stillborn De
Tomaso project and given a quick makeover as well as
Pininfarina badges.
The
new concept has however been named after the Italian
City of Cambiano next to Turin which is
long
time home to the headquarters of the Pininfarina Group,
and in particular chosen as the title to celebrate an
important double anniversary this year: 30 years of the
Pininfarina Styling Centre whose operations got underway
in Cambiano in 1982 (at the beginning it was known as
the “Pininfarina Studi e Ricerche/Pininfarina Study and
Research” centre) and also ten years of the Pininfarina
Engineering Centre, which was inaugurated in 2002 with
the aim of adding to the firm's existing styling and
development/niche production activities, with the wider
offer of engineering services for other companies and
carmakers.
Pininfarina says that
it will unveil further images of the Cambiano concept on
its Facebook page "in the next few days" as the final
two month countdown to its world première in Geneva gets
underway.
