The luxury automaker is planning to complain to
Chinese officials about a blatant knock-off of one of
its vehicles on sale in the country, Autocar reports .
The Land Wind X7 is the spitting image of the Range
Rover Evoque , which is set to be built in China this
year for sale there. Even the name is nearly the
same as Land Rover, and Land Wind went so far as
to file for a patent on the design.
"The fact that this kind of copying is ongoing in
China is very disappointing," Land Rover CEO Ralf
Speth told Autocar. "The simple principal is that it is
not something that should happen; the Intellectual
Property is owned by Jaguar Land Rover and if you
break that IP then you are in breach of international
regulations that apply around the world.”
While the Evoque is priced at over $60,000, the X7
sells for just $22,000.
Land Rover isn’t alone in being on the wrong end of
the imitation game. BMW, Lexus and others have
had to deal with copycats of their vehicles, and a
Ford F-150 clone went on sale there earlier this
year.
Analysts say the Chinese legal system offers little
recourse in many of these cases, and automakers
usually just ignore it, leaving it up to the customers
to know the difference between a fake and the real
thing, but it doesn’t look like Land Rover is going to
take this one lying down.
“I cannot imagine Chinese officials will be happy at
any actions that undermine the credibility of the
country,” Speth said. ” What we have seen today is
not correct."
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