In this week’s round-up of automotive gossip, we chat plug-ins with Nissan and hear from Audi’s design boss on E-trons, Mercedes commits to Renault and friends and more. 

PHEV Juke nuked

Despite the second-gen Renault Captur offering a plug-in hybrid, the same can’t be said for the new Nissan Juke, which is built on the same platform thanks to the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance. Nissan bosses refused to confirm a plug-in hybrid variant, questioning whether Juke customers would be willing to pay for the technology. The car is engineered to accept electrification, so a parallel hybrid system could be brought in from Japan.

Lichte picks Sportback; snubs E-tron

Audi design boss Marc Lichte would pick the E-tron Sportback over the E-tron. He said: “I have a big respect for BMW for coming up with the idea to combine a coupé with an SUV but, honestly, I don’t like it. We thought ‘how can we do this in a very attractive way?’ and you will see the E-tron Sportback [is the result]. I love it. We took the bottom part of the E-tron, cut the roofline and add the A7 roof. Very simple.”