There will be no replacements for the Maybach 57 and 62, Daimler CEO Dieter Zetsche has announced, and the brand itself is to be wound up. The luxury division, reinvented amidst much hype in 2003, has for many years failed to meet its sales and profitability targets: last year, only 157 cars were sold worldwide.
Daimler failed to give the Maybach 57 and 62 any styling updates between their launch and an eventual minor update at April 2010’s Beijing motor show. That, combined with slow sales, led to years of speculation over the future of the brand. Zetsche’s statement to the German media over the past weekend thus only confirmed many suspicions.
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The axing of Maybach will no doubt be seen as good news by Daimler shareholders who have seen what many analysts believe might have been as much as more than a billion euro spent on the now failed experiment.
Author: Glenn Brooks
