Volkswagen says its Golf Plus successor will be bigger to appeal more to young families.
VW showed its plans for the model with the Sportsvan, a near-production concept that debuted at the Frankfurt auto show last week.
VW will phase out the Golf Plus name in favor of Sportsvan in most markets when the production version of the car goes on sale in Europe next summer.
"The [Golf Plus] was bought more by older customers. With the Sportsvan we think we can get more families," head of engineering for exterior, interior and safety at the VW brand, Christian Strube, told Automotive News Europe on the sidelines of the show.
The Golf Plus accounts for more than 20 percent of the Golf line's sales in Germany, a VW spokesman said. Through July, VW sold 39,798 units of the Golf Plus in Europe, which represented 12 percent of all Golf sales in the region, according to figures from JATO Dynamics.
VW believes that the Sportsvan's production version could win customers from premium brands. "Now that the Mercedes A class has become a more conventional hatchback we might get people from that," a spokesman said.
Like the Golf, the new Sportsvan will be underpinned by VW's MQB architecture. At 4338mm the Sportsvan is 134mm longer than the Golf Plus. It also will have 74 additional liters of luggage space, raising the total to 498 liters. A sliding rear seat helps boost space to 585 liters.
Engines will include four versions of VW's 1.4-liter turbocharged gasoline engine and three diesel variants, including a BlueMotion version with CO2 emissions as low as 95 gram per kilometer, VW said.
The current Golf Plus will remain in production until the end of the year.
