The new Peugeot 408 has been unveiled today in Beijing, China in front of more than 700 network representatives. The Peugeot 408 was specifically tailored for the Chinese market and was designed by the company's styling teams in Europe and China. Judging from its name, some might believe the Peugeot 408 is actually the new version of the current 407, which is not. The current 407 will be replaced by the 508 and the newly unveiled Peugeot 408 is just a model for the Asian market.
The French carmaker has released very few technical details of the Peugeot 408. The car is a four-door sedan measuring 4.68 m in length. Up until this point, the engine and transmission options offered by the Peugeot 408 have not been
made public. The Peugeot 408 price and availability will also be announced at a later date.
Peugeot Press Release:
A decisive step in the Lion's offensive on the world's foremost automobile market. Presented today, as a world premier on the Chinese market, to around 300 Chinese journalists and more than 700 network representatives by Jean-Marc Gales the Marque's Managing Director, the new Peugeot 408
marks a furtherstep in the Marque's offensive on the world's foremost automobile market.
Despite being present on the Chinese market for 5 years only, the Peugeot Marque sold over 410 000 vehicles in 2009. This corresponds to a 44% sales increase compared with its 2008 performance.
Following its fine performance in the M1 segment with the success of the 307 saloon and the 307 notch-back, of which 3,522,800 have beenproduced worldwide, Peugeot is now quite legitimately embarking on Chinese market offensive with its new Peugeot 408 DF Peugeot.
This new prestigious notchback tailored for the Chinese market will serve to reinforce Dong Feng Peugeot's product offer on the M1 segment that accounts for over 45 % of the total market.
In this manner, the new Peugeot DF 408 should enable the Lion Marque to increase its sales volumes by over 30% in 2010, compared with 2009, and thereby to grow at twice the forecast pace of the market. This half-height architecture notch-back saloon has been designed and developed jointly by Peugeot's Styling teams in Europe and China and meets three objectives: embody the Marque's
modernity, guarantee maximum safety and offer unrivalled interior space.
The Peugeot 408 name follows the Lion Marque's traditional naming logic. The figure 4 refers to the size of the car (4.68 m) and its positioning in themedium-luxury family saloon segment. The 0 in the middle signifies that it belongs to the Peugeot Marque, while the 8 expresses the vehicle generation.
With this name, the Peugeot 408 naturally falls into place within the current Peugeot range and becomes the forerunner of the 8 series, the latest generation vehicles to be launched on the Chinese market.
The Dong Feng Peugeot 408 is the fruit of work by the joint venture set up between PSA Peugeot Citroën and the Chinese group DFM. The car is being produced at the Wuhan plant in Hubei province in China. It is positioned to become one of the market's benchmark vehicles with a full-year sales target of 100,000 units
