If this car was put together by Alfa Romeo, it could now be among the greats

At the beginning of the 2000s, there were also smaller brands struggling with financial problems. Alfa Romeo was just showing signs of recovery, the 156/147 compact double was running quite well, but then many people felt the wind of the future: a leisure car must be produced.

The BMW X5 paved the way, survival for Porsche, and the launch of the Cayenne was a boost. There was a burning need for a similar model at Alfa Romeo, so Kamal was presented at the 2003 Geneva Motor Show, which was considered a real spectacle at the time. The most muscular, 250 horsepower version of the famous Busso V6 worked under the hood of the car, but according to the plans, an even more powerful power source supplied by General Motors was also expected in the future.

The Kamal came with all-wheel drive, which was solved with a Torsen differential, and got a height-adjustable air suspension chassis. The Alfa Romeo 156 Crosswagon Q4 received such a system, and almost all tests praised its all-wheel drive, which can be used well in the field.

So the recipe looked good, and the form brought it, which could be called fashionable at the time: the appearance of the car, designed under the direction of Wolfgang Egger, was a kind of “best of” compilation: the front recalled the Alfa 8C coupé concept, and the rear It reminded me of 147. Production of the Kamal was reported to have started in 2007 and would have been based on the new 147 platform.

However, almost nothing happened for more than two years as Alfa engineers struggled to continue the project due to lack of financial support. By August 2005, the Kamal’s platform had moved from the originally reworked Fiat Stilo underpinnings (which would have received air suspension and other extras) to the larger 159 sedan underpinnings. This was the start of the sprint, instead of clear goals, plans began to be passed, and the type was repositioned.

There was already a lot of competition in the mid-range size class, so they moved down one size class and wanted to launch the car on the market in 2006.

This was probably done so that Alfa could take advantage of the opportunities of the fast-growing crossover market and the segment’s high profit rates, thus alleviating the financial difficulties of the parent company Fiat at the time.

But then another “optimization” intervened. Fiat bought Alfa Romeo and Maserati under the same umbrella, so Kamal’s plans were intertwined with the Maserati Kubang with a similar concept.

It has been postponed many times

However, as of March 2006, we still haven’t seen the Kamal final version. Alfa eventually shelved the project, officially citing that they could not justify the introduction of an SUV until hatchback and sedan sales improved.

It’s ironic, since today’s Alfa executives are now saying that the brand cannot release a new small car or sports car until the SUV range is expanded. Despite all this, according to Alfa’s internal sources, the Kamal project remained “very seriously under consideration”. In August 2007, it was put on the table again.

The model, running under the new code name CXOver, would be on a common platform with a Fiat crossover, using the foundations of the 147’s successor.

It was scheduled to be introduced in 2010, right after the Milano (which was later renamed the Giulietta), and sources inside Alfa confirmed that the model would be heavily based on the Kamal concept. However, by the time Alfa got to this point, the premium crossover market was well ahead of the competition.

Again.

It would have been planned for 2010, as a sibling of the Giulietta, with similar engines and solutions. The debut, however, was missed this time, even though it was still possible to make a lot of money, the Land Rover Evoque was launched in 2011, and in a short time it became the most important model of the brand, in 2012-2013, only this model accounted for 36 percent of sales.

He had to wait a long time

Alfa Romeo, on the other hand, was teetering in the gray zone between constant destruction and reincarnation. The leisure car introduction was kept on being postponed, they didn’t want to throw in a half-finished model. And the boss of Fiat at the time, Sergio Marchionne, defended the decision, as they had already made this mistake during the introduction of the 159. This is how the Alfa Romeo leisure car ended up on the latest, completely clean slate Giorgio platform, as the sibling of the Giulia.

On the technical basis, which was originally designed for fifteen models, but due to the merger with Stellantis and in the spirit of a fresh start, they were almost completely thrown in the trash.