Could the Amarok’s future be Chinese?

Volkswagen has shown a camouflaged next-generation Amarok for South America built on hardware from Chinese partner SAIC. It has yet to say what will underpin the global Amarok sold here when that truck is replaced.

The South American model is a version of the ute sold in New Zealand as the LDV Terron 9 and the MG U9, and in China as the Maxus Interstellar X.

It is not a break from Ford. South America never received the Ranger-based Amarok. VW kept the original 2010 truck in production there on its own ladder frame, facelifting it twice, most recently in 2024. The SAIC platform replaces a 16-year-old Volkswagen design, not a Ford one.

The new truck goes on sale in 2027, built at VW’s General Pacheco plant in Argentina, which has produced Amaroks since 2010. VW says it will be electrified and the most powerful Amarok yet but has not released outputs. A range-topping 800 TSI plug-in hybrid is reported to make more than 350kW and 800Nm, and to reach 100km/h in under five seconds. A turbodiesel is expected to continue. The Terron 9 uses a 2.5-litre unit here, rated at 164kW and 520Nm.

VW will end up selling two unrelated utes under one badge, the Ranger-based version built at Silverton in South Africa for global markets including ours, and the SAIC-based version built in Argentina.

The New Zealand line-up, launched in 2022 and now V6-only, runs from $92,990 for the Style to $105,900 for the Aventura.

What replaces it has not been settled. VW has confirmed a third-generation Amarok but not who will engineer it. Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles global boss Stefan Mecha told Drive at last year’s Munich show the current truck had “another five years” in it and that it was too early to say what came next. He said VW was looking at every option and would keep talking to Ford. He also questioned whether Amarok volumes alone justified engineering a ladder-frame ute in-house.

SAIC’s architecture launched in China at the end of 2024. The Ford T6 platform beneath the current Amarok dates to 2011, updated to T6.2 for the 2022 model.

Ford and VW share more than the ute. Ford builds electric models in Cologne on Volkswagen’s MEB platform, and the two co-operate on vans covering the Transit Custom and Transporter, and the Transit Connect and Caddy.

Ford is also sourcing vehicles from China. Its new Transit City electric van is built by joint-venture partner JMC in Nanchang for European sale, and Ford New Zealand has confirmed it is on its way here.

There is a price gap to bridge. VW sells the Amarok above $90,000 in New Zealand, while the SAIC hardware is on the market as an LDV from $54,990 and an MG from $60,990.

On Mecha’s timeline the current truck runs out around 2030, so a decision is due well before then.