What's the news?
If you came here expecting to see what the next-generation Skoda Yeti will look like, I hate to disappoint you... This is the VisionS concept, or at least a sketch of it - the real thing will appear in all its finery at the upcoming Geneva Motor Show. It's not a look at the new Yeti (although there will be some stylistic similarities) but instead is a look ahead to a new, larger Skoda SUV, which will be a rival to the likes of the Honda CR-V, Kia Sorento and Hyundai Santa Fe.
Expected to the called the Kodiak, the new 4x4 will be a big old thing - the VisionS concept is 4.7 metres long and 1.9 metres wide. Skoda has sprinkled it with light though, both in the sense that it has used crystal elements in the headlights and in the paintwork (meant to reflect the Czech tradition of working with high-quality crystals) and also in the sense that it won't be heavy; the bonnet for instance is made of light-but-strong plastic polycarbonate.
There's a lot of guff in the official notes about the "sharp tornado line spanning the entire length of the powerful car body" and a "quickly sloping roofline with the long spoiler and tapered rear visually accelerate the show car even when stationary" but the real message here is that this is a big, practical Skoda SUV, which will be available with seven seats (as well as a five-seat version with a massive boot) and which will massacre even the mighty Superb estate when it comes to cabin and cargo space.
Underneath lurks the usual Volkswagen Group MQB platform, which means 1.6 and 2.0-litre TDI diesel engines, probably a petrol option with a 1.4 and/or 2.0 TSI and almost certainly, within a year of launch, the fitting of Volkswagen's GTE plugin hybrid system.
And the Yeti? Oh, don't worry - that's coming eventually too, but probably not until late 2018. It will be a little larger than the current car (albeit still smaller than the new Volkswagen Tiguan, with which it shares much of its mechanical makeup) and will (sadly) ditch the current Yeti's Tonka-Toy styling for something smoother and sleeker, and closely related to the looks of this VisionS.