Bugatti Bordeaux / Royale looking likely

We reported a couple of weeks ago on rumours flying around about a four-door Bugatti, which would either be the Bordeaux or the Royale. It’s nice to speculate, and the speculation – which has been around forever – did have some substance. Bugatti had issued an invite to Veyron owners to an event, and the invitation had the image you see above on it. Quad tail pipes and all.

So it’s clear that Bugatti are moving in some direction or other. We had the news yesterday that Bugatti is making no more limited editions after the Sang Bleu, which tends to indicate that – as Veyron production is nearing the end – their focus is going to be elsewhere. But where, exactly?

Well, Autocar has been having a chat with Bugatti boss Dr Franz-Josef Pfaegen, and he’s shed a bit of light on things. First out he makes it clear that any future Bugatti won’t be based on the new Bentley Mulsanne (both Bugatti and Bentley are VW companies). But our guess is he means it won’t be a Bentley Mulsanne re-skin. But we’d be surprised if VW don’t use the Mulsanne chassis. After all, it’s a brand new, bespoke chassis and it would certainly help costs to utilise it elsewhere.

But what the good doctor also said is that Bugatti has three possibilities in mind for the next new Bugatti. So Bugatti are going to show the Bugatti Bordeaux concept to a select bunch of Veyron owner to get their reaction. If it’s favourable it will give Bugatti a way forward. If not, they have a couple of other ideas up their sleeves. But what of their other ideas?

Well, it seems pretty clear that any Bugatti Bordeaux will be a four-door coupe saloon. Slick and sleek. And probably exactly what a four-door Veyron should be. But perhaps one of the others is a great big super-limo to overshadow the RR Phantom and Maybach. That could be a new Bugatti Royale. The third option? Probably an extreme version of the existing Veyron – lighter; more powerful; more extreme.

Guess we’ll just have to wait and see.