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Toyota

It's Cadillac vs. Lincoln at New York Auto Show

Alisa Priddle
Detroit Free Press
Stunt driver Jim Dowdell takes the aluminum-body 2016 Jaguar XF sedan, going on sale late 2015, 787-ft. across Royal Dock in London’s Canary Wharf on two high wires to publicize the redesigned car.

A high-stakes luxury vehicle battle will be on display at the 2015 New York International Auto Show this week with important debuts expected from Cadillac, Lincoln, Lexus and other luxury brands.

"Let the good times roll," said Michelle Krebs, analyst with AutoTrader.com. "It reflects the health of the industry."

The much-hyped Cadillac CT6 will break cover after months of hype about a full-size sedan with some of the best technology that General Motors has to offer. The car will be unveiled to the media Tuesday night, on the eve of the start of media days on Wednesday.

Lincoln, meanwhile, is expected to show a sedan concept in keeping with its promise to introduce a replacement for the current MKS next year. A large sedan is the last of four new products promised by 2016. The first three are the MKZ, MKC and the MKX which is coming this summer.

Lexus has the world debut of the all-new 2016 RX, the fourth generation of the luxury crossover that defined a new vehicle segment 17 years ago. Its importance cannot be understated; the RX accounted for more than 107,000 of the brand's 137,000 total light truck sales in 2014 and a third of the brand's total sales of about 311,000.

Mercedes-Benz is staging the global premiere of the GLE, the latest generation mid-size utility vehicle, at an event Tuesday night. Under Mercedes' new naming system, all SUVs start with "GL" and the "E" refers to it being a midsize vehicle similar to the E-Class. This is the family of vehicles that has been called ML to date. The first of the new GLEs will go on sale later this year.

Jaguar has the new 2016 XF mid-size luxury sedan, the first new model since India's Tata bought the British brand.

At the other end of the price spectrum, Merrcedes' Smart division has a debut of its own planned.

And Toyota's Scion small car brand has not one but two global debuts; the iM 5-door hatchback and the newly named iA sedan. Billed as the evolution of Scion, the new additions to the lineup are designed for young buyers.

Toyota also will use the New York show to debut its first RAV4 hybrid. The RAV4 compact crossover was introduced for the 2012 model year and is a high-volume vehicle for the automaker. The first hybrid version will be unveiled on Thursday and could share the technology that is in the Lexus NX 300h luxury compact crossover hybrid which is from the same vehicle family as the RAV4.

Toyota is dropping at hints of the look of the electric RAV4 it will introduce at the New York Auto Show

Kia has the new 2016 Optima mid-size sedan — the automaker's biggest seller in the U.S. — which will go on sale later this year while Mitsubishi has the world premiere of the 2016 Outlander crossover.

And enthusiasts will get their first look at the 2016 Ford Focus RS, a European high-performance car that will be sold in the U.S. for the first time.

The 2015 auto show circuit is notable for the strength of the shows to date and New York continues the momentum. The year started with the North American International Auto Show in Detroit in January which served notice that spending on cars is back in vogue with the introduction of some supercars: the Ford GT and Acura NSX and other exotics including the Alfa Romeo 4C spider and Cadillac's CTS-V.

The Detroit show was almost pure flash: none of the major debuts were high-volume mainstream vehicles.

Then came the Chicago Auto Show in February which picked up the mainstream slack with the first look at the all-new Honda Pilot, the updated Chevrolet Equinox, Toyota Avalon and special editions of the high-volume Camry and Corolla, to name a few.

March is New York's turn to shine with two media days starting Wednesday and more than 60 new vehicles to reveal before it opens to the public from April 3-12.

Automakers have to keep up a strong cadence of new vehicles to make sales and market share gains, Krebs said, which is why this auto show season is seeing aggressive product rollouts.

"New is not new very long. After 18 months, vehicles start to feel old. The bloom comes off the rose very quickly and there is tremendous pressure to keep the showroom fresh to win share."

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