Opel reveals name of new compact SUV

Opel/Vauxhall will name its new compact SUV the Grandland X, General Motors' European subsidiary said Thursday. The new car will be revealed late in 2017 and go on sale in 2018.

The Grandland X is the second Opel model developed in partnership with PSA Group following the smaller Crossland X, which replaces the Meriva small minivan and goes on sale next year.

The new Grandland X, a the sister model to the new Peugeot 3008, will be built by PSA at its plant in Sochaux, France, where production of the new Opel Zafira minivan will start next year.

The new compact SUV will give Opel/Vauxhall a long-awaited competitor to hot-selling models such as the Nissan Qashqai, Hyundai Tucson, Kia Sportage and Ford Kuga.

The design "blends elegance with ruggedness," Opel said in a statement. "It will offer customers a raised seating position, good all-round visibility and plenty of luggage space," the company added.

The car bears Opel's new X naming system that indicates it is a crossover or SUV. The Grandland X will bring the number of X cars to three, starting with the updated Mokka X subcompact SUV.

Opel/Vauxhall's fourth X model will be a large SUV that will share a platform with the new-generation Insignia Grand Sport midsize sedan that is due next year, the automaker has said. The large SUV will have more rugged styling than the crossovers, Opel Group CEO Karl-Thomas Neumann told journalists at the Paris auto show in September. No launch date has been announced for the SUV.

The Crossland X subcompact crossover goes on sale next year and will be built in GM's plant in Zaragoza, Spain. Peugeot and Citroen will begin selling their own versions of the crossover around the same time.

The Opel/Vauxhall variant will be sold alongside the similar-sized Mokka X, but the Crossland X has a "very stylized" design that will be softer than a typical SUV in its looks, Neumann said at the Paris show.

"We might be a little bit overcrowded [with multiple models in Eurorpe's crossover/SUV segments]," he said, "but it's not as bad not being there."