Is this the new Infiniti flagship?
Tue, 13 Aug 2013
Infiniti selected Alfonso Albaisa as its executive design director in May of this year, and if the leaked image above is any indication, the man has been hard at work these last few months. Sent in an electric missive to us from the very heart of the Infiniti design shop, we can't say exactly who the source of this rendering is, but we do recognize Albaisa's signature in the bottom left corner.
Details as to just what the image represents for the future Infiniti range are non-existent at this point, but the form of the car does lend itself to some educated guesses. While the detailing of the large grille, headlights and kinked rear-quarter glass all follow current Infiniti styling conventions, the proportions of the design raise our eyebrows a bit.
As you can see, there's an awful lot of wheelbase stretched between those exaggerated wheels, and quite a bit of real estate between the front axle and the dash, as well. Both those things point strongly at a "flagship" car to sit at the top of the model line. Currently, Infiniti's M range (soon to be renamed Q70) resides at the top of the brand's portfolio; as the fourth generation of that car was introduced for the 2011 model year, a clean-sheet redesign seems unlikely.
That just leaves us with the idea of a long-wished for replacement for the company's old Q range, last seen in North America as the Q45, and with many reports calling it dead forever. A fullsize luxury player certainly makes sense in the context of the image here, and a sexy one at that. As for its name? Infiniti's all-Q structure would seemingly peg a range-topping sedan as either a Q80 or a Q90, depending fully on whether or not the brand wished to reserve the Q80 moniker for a Q70 (that's the M, remember?) based coupe/convertible product.
By Seyth Miersma