‘Premium positioning’ for new Volkswagen Amarok

The second-generation Volkswagen Amarok is gearing up to carve its own European-flavoured slice of Australia’s sizeable ute market with an emphasis on style, technology and a class-leading level of standard equipment in the category.

Targeting at least 10,000 sales annually, Volkswagen Australia insists its all-new Amarok – which shares its underpinnings with the new Ford Ranger – will not just be a clone of the award-winning, Australian-developed Blue Oval ute when it hits local dealerships a few months later than expected in April 2023.

“We’ve got a… premium positioning of the car in terms of its specification – that’s what our customers have wanted over the years,” says Volkswagen Australia commercial vehicles director Ryan Davies.

“The technology is a massive step up, it’s a game changer… we’re going to have what is a generational leap.”

Volkswagen’s local LCV chief also nominates the more European-inspired design as something that will tempt Aussie ute buyers towards the new Amarok.

“Aesthetically we’re completely different [to the Ford Ranger]. We have our own styling that really evolves from what you're seeing in the Volkswagen family.

“To my mind the Volkswagen has a much more premium look and feel.”

Another big point of differentiation for the Australian market is the inclusion of a petrol engine in the Amarok line-up.

Davies says the 222kW/452Nm 2.3-litre four-cylinder turbo-petrol engine is proving an early sales surprise for the Amarok in a market segment that’s mostly addicted to diesel engines.

But as with the new Ranger, the lusty 3.0-litre V6 diesel is shaping up to be the big-hitter in the new Amarok range. Davies says highly-specified V6 variants have so far accounted for about 70 per cent of pre-orders, exceeding early expectations.

“We weren't sure how popular that engine was going to be but since we’ve talked about that engine we probably identified that maybe we’ve under-called that in terms of the interest,” he says.

“That’s something that we’re going to be evaluating over the next months as we start taking orders.”

Davies also points to the longer list of standard equipment for the new Amarok – something that’s also expected to lead to a higher price tag (pricing is expected to be announced within weeks).

Volkswagen is also confident it will get strong early supplies of the new Amarok – this time from South Africa – which is hot topic amid the global supply chain crisis currently impacting the industry.

But there could still be the occasional hiccup with some features, with the electronic brake controller likely to be left off some more affordable model variants early in the delivery rollout; Volkswagen says it can easily retrofit the brake controller after delivery.

However, Davies said the company would remain “true to our brand” and would not pull safety tech out of the vehicles if microchip shortages begin to impact manufacturing.

Join the conversation at 

our Facebook page

Or email us at 

editor@carsales.com.au