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Cadillac ATS was almost front-wheel drive

"We were going to do a front-wheel drive Cadillac compact off of Delta because it was going to be less expensive," Doug Parks, General Motors' vice president of global product programs, told the Automotive News during the Detroit Auto Show in January of this year. That sentence, referring to early ATS discussions more than five years ago - a period when the automaker, and the industry, was struggling - reveals that Cadillac's highly acclaimed rear-wheel drive compact sedan almost never happened.
Parks revealed that that automaker actually built a 2.0-liter test mule, on GM's Delta platform (shared with the Chevrolet Cruze and Buick Verano) and tested it in Europe. While the prototype was "pretty darn good," according to Parks, the team realized that in order to compete against Mercedes-Benz and BMW it would have to invest in a new rear-wheel drive platform.
The resulting all-new Alpha platform would eventually underpin the Cadillac ATS, and many would argue that its balanced rear-wheel drive chassis is its single most important attribute. Thankfully, the Alpha's goodness won't stop with the ATS. The upcoming 2014 Cadillac CTS and the future Camaro will also share its architecture, meaning the Cimarron will remain a distant memory.

Weekly Recap: GM scales back as Russian auto market teeters

General Motors' extensive plans to scale back its Russian operations are the latest sign the automotive market in the former superpower is collapsing – and there are few signs of recovery. GM said Wednesday it will stop selling mainstream Chevrolets and shutter the entire Opel brand in Russia. The moves leave GM with a luxury-focused presence consisting of Cadillac and Chevrolet's Corvette, Camaro and Tahoe. The cutbacks will be completed by the end of the year. The automaker will also idle its factory in St. Petersburg and end a contract-assembly agreement with Russian manufacturer GAZ. "We had to take decisive action in Russia to protect our business," Opel Group CEO Karl-Thomas Neumann said in a statement. "We confirm our outlook to return the European business to profitability in 2016 and stick to our long-term goals." GM is the latest automaker to scale back in Russia as the economic conditions, volatile currency and uncertainty over the conflict in the Ukraine all have sandbagged new car sales. Last month, vehicle sales collapsed 38 percent in Russia to 128,298 units, according to the Association of European Business, which records sales. Joerg Schreiber, chairman of the AEB automobile manufacturers committee, didn't even feign optimism in a statement announcing the figures. "The market is entering a very difficult phase now, and February is only the beginning," he said. "Industry sentiment is the next few months will be extremely difficult and the market bottom has yet to be found." The dovetails with industry experts, who predict the Russian auto sector will remain in the doldrums. IHS said earlier this year it expects Russia's sales to slip to just 1.8 million units in 2015, which is a 40-percent drop from 2012. Other News & Notes Chief leads Jeep's Easter Safari stable Jeep is bringing seven attention-getting concepts to Moab for its annual Easter Safari off-roading celebration in Utah, but the Chief is perhaps the standout of the group. It salutes the 1970s Cherokee with a throwback appearance and surfer styling cues. The Chief has a custom modified razor grille made famous by the Wagoneer, and it rolls on 17-inch slotted mag wheels. The surf theme comes in with ocean blue paint, floral cloth and leather seats and a tiki-style shifter handle. Based on the Jeep Wrangler, the Chief has removable sides, a 3.6-liter V6 engine and a six-speed manual gearbox.

Cadillac abandons plans for six-digit flagship sedan

So much for that party. Cadillac has announced that it is walking away from plans to build a high-dollar, rear-wheel-drive ultraluxury sedan. The low-volume model would have been based on the lusty Ciel Concept, and the production iteration would have carried a price tag well over $100,000. Executives with the automaker reportedly claim the model wouldn't have bolstered the brand enough to be worth the investment.
Even so, Automotive News reports Cadillac is still on track to build a range-topping four-door to go head-to-head with the BMW 7 Series and Mercedes-Benz S-Class. That model will likely be constructed on the company's upcoming Omega rear-wheel-drive platform, but we won't see it bow until at least 2016. Right now, the front-wheel-drive XTS sits at the top of the Cadillac lineup, and while that machine and it's twin-turbocharged V6 variant makes a compelling argument against certain luxury entries, it falls short serving as a legitimate competitor for the likes of the 7 Series and S-Class for enthusiast drivers.