Mercedes GLA Concept: OFFICIAL

The Mercedes GLA Concept – the compact SUV version of the new A-Class – has been officially revealed ahead of its debut at the Shanghai Motor Show.

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Yesterday we had the first photos of the new Mercedes GLA ahead of its reveal at Shanghai, and this morning Mercedes has woken up and delivered the GLA officially.

Aimed at cars like the BMW X1 and Audi Q3, the GLA is a good-looking compact SUV that carries much of what’s good about the new A-Class, raises its ride height, adds a few butch bits and creates a car that will probably have more appeal for owners of the old A-Class than the new A-Class does.

The GLA heading for the Shanghai Motor Show sports a 2.0 litre turbo with 208bp, 4MATIC and a 7G-DCT gearbox – which we guess makes it a GLA 250 – and sports something new – laser headlights that function as projectors.

The GLA features a pair of cameras on the front of the roof rails that can take 3D HD images and can be removed if you want to use them for mountain biking or jet-skiing or whatever floats your sporty boat. The images produced – or any images from the COMAND or your Smartphone can then be projected by the laser headlights on to a screen or any surface.

Inside, the GLA Concept is a bit on the ‘concepty’ side – although firmly based on the A-Class architecture – and features hand-stitched seams on the brown leather with canvas centre sections and an illuminated insert in the headrests.

The back of the front seats gets a grey leather finish and the rear seats are individual ones and the air vents dominate the style cues of the interior in much the same way as they did on concept versions of the A Class and CLA, and they are illuminated in a colour to match the temperature of the air delivered.

The GLA Concept will get its public debut at the Shanghai Motor Show and we’re expecting the production version of the GLA to arrive at Frankfurt in September and go on sale in early 2014.