Well, that didn’t take that long.

We have been speculating lately about the nature of a coupe offering from Cadillac on the Alpha chassis and how they might choose to follow the Audi model of building a model sized between Alpha (ATS) and Alpha+ (CTS) to allow the styling of the current CTS coupe to continue. The assumption we were going on was that ATS was too small to support the rakish lines of the CTS coupe and the new CTS is too large to carry a coupe offering without looking somewhat cartoonish.

Now we have this spy shot of what seems to be an ATS coupe in the flavor of a BMW 3-Series coupe with a unique roofline, but maintaining the headroom of the sedan. In other words, trade the show-car good looks and roofline of the CTS coupe for the practicality needed in an ATS-sized model.

Of course, we will need to see further spy shots in the future to help dial in if this is merely a coupe-ified ATS or a more unique model. Given the level of finish on this car, we’d expect a coupe to hit next year, possibly as a 2014.

Source: Autoweek

Categories: ATS, CTS, News, Rumored Models, Spy photos
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The folks at C&D have spotted the ATS-V undergoing testing.

Peering through the heavy camo, you can make out the more aggressive grill and bumper treatments (likely mesh-filled as is the V-Series trademark). Out back are wider wheels and tires as well as quad exhausts.

We fully expect the ATS-V to carry a version of Cadillac’s new 3.6 DI twin-turbo engine. Given the ATS-V’s M3-beating mission, we’d expect the car to have this engine putting out north of the CTS VSport 420hp. 450 certainly sounds like a nice round number, doesn’t it?

We’d also expect both manual and automatic transmission options for what might be our new favorite Cadilac.

Source: Car and Driver

Categories: ATS, Rumored Models, Spy photos
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Over the past few days, we have seen many articles about how Cadillac is ‘pondering a new CTS Coupe’ given comments at the New York Auto Show by GM brass that the CTS Coupe is the best selling luxury coupe on the market.

This has lead to feverish conjecture about Cadillac building a 2-door off of the new CTS within a year or two of the sedan’s introduction to keep things going.

However, here at the Caddy Edge, we will take a somewhat contrarian view that we believe fits a bit better with what Cadillac might do with their latest platforms.

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Categories: ATS, CTS, Rumored Models
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The Challenge

tCE gets access to Cadillac’s latest models for reviews on occasion and this time we have had the opportunity to drive around in Cadillac’s latest and possibly riskiest model to date, the ATS.

Risky because ATS enters a space in the market dominated by entries such as the Infiniti G, Audi A4, Mercedes C-Class, and the grand-daddy of them all, the BMW 3-Series. This is a segment that was practically invented by BMW decades ago with the 2002 and later expanded with the 3-Series. Before the advent of this class by BMW a sedan with sports car moves just didn’t exist.

In models past, Cadillac has attempted to compete by creating products that live in spaces between the competition’s offerings. The CTS, the first piece of Cadillac’s rebirth, was priced against the 3-Series but was half a size larger. Its larger size and a price-point a size down left Cadillac with a car that buyers didn’t understand if they even thought to check out Cadillac at all. This left the company looking like they were unable to build competitive product or perhaps that GM didn’t have the will to build a car.

Here we are 10 years later, Cadillac has developed credibility their latest products including their world-beating V-Series. However, being a one product company was never going to be enough – and they still had a perception problem with their tweener CTS. How was Cadillac going to take the next step?

That brings us to the ATS. Built on a brand new platform that GM calls ‘Alpha’ that will also serve as a basis for several other GM products (the 3rd generation CTS, next Chevrolet Camaro, as well as a rumored small crossover), it had the rumor-mill churning for years.

In fact, the ATS rumors were probably the most skillful playing of the media GM has ever executed. Go back through our own ATS posts and you’ll see how the rumors were stoked by reports that the ATS was way over-weight, a CEO that reported that the ATS is expected to be ‘competitive’ rather than class leading, and even rumors that the Cadillac team was constantly layering in requirements on the platform that were taking it further and further from its intended targets…all feeding into the press’ penchant for expecting GM to over promise and under deliver.

Which is why everyone was so shocked when the production ATS was announced. Rather than the bloated, under-developed car we might have feared…the ATS sized right on top of the previous generation BMW 3-Series and undercuts practically every car in the segment for weight. Weight is not the only bogey that a car in this class needs to hit, but missing it would have been a serious sign that development went wrong. That weight is also split nicely 50/50 front/rear. So the bones were apparently in place.

Suddenly, our expectations are turned on their ears and we, like everyone else, have been eager to spend some seat-time.

Our tester was an ATS V-6, rear-drive, automatic (the only ATS that gets the manual as an option is the 2.0 turbo which we hope to spend some time with soon), equipped with the Performance Collection.

How does this new Cadillac drive? How does its brand-new infotainment system compare to the earlier offerings that have left us unimpressed?

Stay tuned for further installments in our review coming very soon.

Categories: ATS, Reviews
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Cadillac has heard some complaints from owners and the press on its new CUE infotainment system.

Issues center on the responsiveness of the system (something we experienced ourselves with the ATS we recently drove) to both individual touches (haptic feedback can be somewhat hit-or-miss, sometimes happening right away, other times after a bit of lag) as well as responsiveness to gestures (pinch on the Nav screen was decidedly not working as advertised and swipes from one page of icons to another lagged way behind what we have come to expect from tablets).

The software update to address these shortcomings will ship to dealers later this year as owners will have to schedule a visit to allow their service department to install the update (unlike the recent update Ford sent to owners of Sync equipped vehicles that came on a USB drive for self-install).

Also as a nod to buyer feedback, Cadillac announced a plan to re-introduce some physical knobs and buttons in future products to help with the most commonly accessed controls.

This is good news, but we will note that the CUE system is still significantly more usable than the prior infotainment system Cadillac put in their products. But plans to make it better are certainly welcome.

Source: Engadget.com

Categories: ATS, XTS
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Cadillac has dropped of an ATS with V-6 and automatic for our review.

Let us know in the comments anything about the car you are interested in knowing and we’ll make sure to include it in the review.

Categories: ATS, Reviews
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Today, BMW announced that they would be bringing out a new trim/engine in their BMW 3-Series.

Based on a lower-output version of the 2.0T in the 328i (that competes against the mid-tier ATS – with its own 2.0T engine)…the new 320i has 180hp and a starting price over $4k less than the 328i. This puts the new entry-level BMW in line with the 2.5l non-turbo ATS.

Interesting to see BMW responding to Cadillac for once.

Source: CarScoop

Categories: ATS
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