Our 2009 Renault Safrane hit the 10,000 km mark, so we took it in for a dealer service in Dubai. Making the appointment a day earlier by phone was hassle-free, and we dropped off the car at 10 am in the morning.
There is absolutely nothing to report on this car. Absolutely nothing. It is running fine, just as it has been since we bought it last Ramadan. And that is exactly how we like it.
Renault chose to hold the GCC unveiling of the all-new 2011 Renault Safrane at the 2010 Riyadh Motor Show. As we had been speculating for ages, the new model is a simple rebadge of the car that debuted earlier this year in Europe as the Renault Latitude and in Korea as the Nissan-Samsung SM5.
Our black Renault Safrane V6, a brand new 2009 leftover model that we purchased last Ramadan, is on its way to completing 5000 km, and is soldiering on just fine. It also has the best fuel economy in our 3-car fleet by far, for obvious reasons.
So we finally put our money where our mouth is and bought a car that we recommended as an Editor’s Choice more than a year ago. That car happened to be the 2009 Renault Safrane V6, a midsize sedan that is badged as a French Renault, built by Korean Samsung, and designed by Japanese Nissan. That last bit was crucial in coming to our decision, for the Safrane shares a platform with the Altima and the Maxima, with various key components that are purely Nissan items. As luck would have it, the Safrane is not a resounding success, which means buyers can pick up brand new 2009 leftovers at nicely-reduced prices straight from the dealer.
Renault has launched the new Latitude midsize sedan model in its continuing bid to become more mainstream rather than quirky. The Latitude’s world debut was at the 2010 Moscow Auto Show, and will be built in Russia for their local market, but the car is already on sale in Korea as the Samsung SM5, and it is this Korean one that will probably make it to the GCC eventually as a replacement for the Renault Safrane.
Renault GCC will extend its existing line-up with the introduction of four new models across the Middle East by the end of this year. The back-to-back launches are in line with the almost-French manufacturer’s plans to expand its market share within the small and mid-size passenger car segments.
Samsung Motors, the South Korean joint venture with Renault and Nissan, has released the first official photos of the 3rd-generation Samsung SM5 sedan, set to go on sale by late January in its home country. Incidentally, the outgoing SM5 forms the basis for the GCC-spec Renault Safrane, so this new car is likely hitting the UAE market sometime next year as a 2010 or 2011 model.
My PR buddy picked up this Renault Safrane and passed it on to me a day later, with a layer of crap on the outside. However, the cabin was spotless, and there was no denying it — it felt like I was driving around in a Nissan.
One of our readers, Mohamad, pointed us to this thread on nissan-arabia.com, showing local photos of the GCC-spec Renault “mystery sedan” that we exposed some time ago. It looks like the new sedan will revive the Renault Safrane nameplate for this Japanese-designed Korean-built French-badged car.