Fiat and Chrysler announced the four-year plans for all of the companies’ brands and noticeably missing from the Alfa Romeo plan was the Mazda Miata MX-5 based two-seater sports car. Now it seems that despite confirming the joint venture between Mazda and Alfa Romeo, Fiat plans to take over and offer a two-seat convertible itself.
Motor Authority speculates that competition with the upcoming Alfa Romeo 4C may have killed the plans for the Miata based Alfa. Also problematic would be Alfa’s reported plans to only sell vehicles built in Italy, since the brand’s heritage is an important selling point. Backing out of the joint venture with Mazda would be expensive, so that forces Fiat to find another brand to build a car on the platform. Since a Miata-based Jeep would just be silly, chances are the roadster will wear a Fiat badge.
Fiat announced a “specialty car” would launch within the next five years along with the Fiat 500X, which is a crossover version of the 500L. That specialty car could very well be a roadster in the vein of the classic Fiat 124 Sport Spider of the 1970s.
