Volkswagen Announces Mexican-made Three Row Tiguan For The Americas

Volkswagen has announced that it will be introducing a unique seven-seater Tiguan for the North and South American market in 2017. 

The new model will be produced by Volkswagen de Mexico at its Puebla plant by the end of 2016. While the model is aimed primarily at the North and South American market, the company did not rule out exports for other markets other than the Europe Union and China.

“Localization has become key to safeguarding our competitive position on the global market and manufacturing the Tiguan in Mexico will bring production closer to the US-market,” said Michael Horn, president and CEO of Volkswagen Group of America.

The seven-seater (actually it's more like a 5+2 seater) Tiguan will be made at a new line in Volkswagen's Puebla plant.

This is not the first time Volkswagen has produced a stretched Tiguan. The company's Shanghai-Volkswagen joint venture in China also manufacturers a long wheelbase Tiguan model at its Anting plant. The Chinese market only long wheelbase Tiguan measures 4,506 mm long, 80 mm longer than a standard wheelbase Tiguan, but it remains only as a five-seater model.

Considering the 2017 timeline, we are inclined to believe that this Tiguan model refers to a next generation model rather than the current generation Tiguan, which has been on the market since 2007. By 2017, it is reasonable to expect that the Tiguan will be replaced by an all-new MQB platform-based model.