Skip to main content

Lamborghini will build a really expensive SUV in Italy starting in 2018

Lamborghini will build a really expensive SUV in Italy starting in 2018

Share this story

People want SUVs. Especially rich people, it seems: look no further than the Bentley Bentayga, Land Rover's recent announcement of the SVAutobiography, or Rolls-Royce's upcoming soft-roader, all of which will sell for $200,000 or more. And Lamborghini has been in the conversation for a while, too: it showed the Urus concept (pictured above) back in 2012 without fully committing to building it.

But now, that's changing. The exotic automaker announced this morning that it'll bring an SUV to market with a projected release of 2018 — and it wants to sell 3,000 a year, more than Lamborghini's current annual sales in their entirety. (The company currently sells just two "mainstream" models, the Huracán and Aventador coupes.) After recent negotiations involving tax breaks, Reuters reports, the SUV will be built in Italy.

It's easy to cringe at the thought of Lamborghini — best known for it's over-the-top hypercars — giving into market pressure for a vehicle that betrays the brand, but this isn't the company's first production SUV: that honor goes to the LM002, which looked like an extremely angry box and used the V-12 out of a Countach.

Verge Video: A tour of the New York International Auto Show