Maserati is make a baby Quattroporte, according to this week's Autocar.

Running on the same platform as the Alfa Romeo 159 -- due out in November -- it will get four-wheel drive and a V8 engine. It's designed as a mainstream, sporty executive machine to replace parent company Alfa's slow-selling 166.

The idea is that the two marques running side by side, in the form of the new, smaller Quattroporte and the next generation 166, will improve their visibility to buyers in this highly desirable (from a vendor's point of view) middle market.

Expect the car to be around the same size as an Audi A6, suspended on double wishbones front and rear, active anti-rollbars and active rear diff to apportion torque to the two rear wheels. Motive power will come from a GM-sourced 4.6-litre Northstar V8, modified to deliver 290bhp.

Europe will also need a diesel -- but one suspects that Alfa's 200bhp 2.4-litre five-cylinder unit in the 159 won't be potent enough for the job, so that's a story for the future.

With the transfer from Ferrari to Alfa now complete, this looks like Maserati's best chance to break out of what Autocar describes as "it's tiny niche-market status". Expect the car in 2008.

http://www.pistonheads.com/news/defa...?storyId=11725

For reference this is the Alfa Romeo 159:



(pics from 4Car)

I must say, the 159 is rather quite sexy. The Maserati verison should be even nicer. The choice of a Cadillac Northstar engine seems rather odd though. Probably has something to do with GM's collaboration with Fiat.