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Mercedes is gearing up for the launch early next year of the latest version of its Sprinter van. It used the North American Commercial Vehicle Show (NACV) in Atlanta to show of the first sketch of the new Sprinter. It keeps many of the styling cues from the current model, but there is a little more curviness, a little more modernity about the new van.
Where the Sprinter will see some radical change is in the telematic and driver assistance arenas. It's expected to have some seriously high-tech options, including remote data transfer, and some autonomous driving systems.
"We want to do more than just build the best vehicles. We want to offer the most suitable mobility solution for every sector and for every transport assignment. And that is precisely our focus with the upcoming Sprinter generation as an overall system solution. It also goes without saying that the new edition of our iconic van possesses the classical attributes of reliability, safety and cost-effectiveness," Volker Mornhinweg, Head of Mercedes-Benz Vans, said at the NACV show.
The new Sprinter will be built in plants in Dusseldorf and Ludwigsfelde in Germany, and at a new facility in North Carolina, USA, where vans will be built from knock-down kits to avoid stringent US tariffs on imported commercial vehicles.