Ford’s new global SUV, The Edge, will go on sale in the UK next year at a cost of approximately £30,000. It will be interesting to see what The Edge can bring to an increasingly saturated SUV market.
The 5-seater is a relation to the unfortunately named but popular Kuga. With European Kuga sales increasing by a massive 38 per cent according to Ford, the company expects that this big brother will sway those potential customers who may have liked the idea of the Kuga but were eventually persuaded by a more upmarket model.
The mid-sized Edge crossover is manufactured in Ontario, Canada and received its American debut at the famous Detroit International Auto Show in 2006, while models appeared for customer purchase later in the autumn.
Despite the crowded market place for 4×4 vehicles, Ford believes that The Edge has no direct competitor in the UK when comparing the price and size to what is currently out there as an alternative.
The Edge is due to arrive on these shores in 2015, so a fair bit of time to wait, but the already proven vehicle is certain to be a popular choice on our British roads – as long as that price estimate stays the same.
The Edge is a 4-wheel drive SUV powered by either a diesel – no petrol versions are imminent – 178bhp or a twin-turbo 207bhp engine. It will be twinned with the new Mondeo (but don’t let that put you off; it’s only the architecture that binds them together as such), the Galaxy and the S-Max.
The set up is pretty much the same for Europe, apart from the addition of LED lamps and a heated windscreen for the nearly 2 tonne SUV. Ford’s progress on creating a Global brand is interesting, with many competitors still manufacturing specific vehicles for a specific market, Ford is coming to think of the world more logically, as just one place separated by water.
Ford has said that The Edge’s suspension is globally set, rather than fine-tuned to specific continents, which is how we have generally come to expect our vehicles to be set up. That is; bouncy for America and spine-crunchingly hard for the UK. It will be interesting to see if, come 2015, this remains the case.
The Mondeo is due to arrive in the UK later this year and a fair bit of the technology we can expect to see in The Edge will be seen on this vehicle first; which arguably makes The Edge slightly more intriguing now than it is likely to be in 2015 when it finally makes it to the UK.
Images – topgear.com
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