Want a Skoda ute? The global CEO of the company does too, but don't get your hopes up about one coming to showrooms.
The global boss of Skoda has expressed interest in offering a ute of the company's own, to sit alongside the Volkswagen Amarok and new VW-owned Scout brand.
Yet there are still no plans to sell one, despite the Volkswagen-owned Czech brand revealing three pick-up concepts in the past decade, based on models as diverse as the Fabia and Kodiaq.
"I'd love to, but we don't have plans," Skoda CEO Klaus Zellmer told Drive at a media preview ahead of the Munich motor show.
While there may not currently be plans on the table, a Skoda ute was once considered in the life cycle of the original Volkswagen Amarok, which was developed in-house rather than in a partnership with Ford.
Former Skoda Australia boss Michael Irmer told Drive in 2017: "There are only really three markets in the world that are big in this market, in these size utes, which is South America where Skoda is not, there’s South Africa where Skoda is currently not, and there’s Australia.
"There were debates in the previous [first] generation [Amarok], I know, but they did not come to fruition."
The most recent Skoda ute concept chopped the bodywork off a Superb plug-in hybrid wagon from behind the rear doors, adding an adjustable tray which can extend or retract to load or unload cargo as required, designed for carrying bicycles.
It has also converted the previous-generation Kodiaq SUV into the two-door, high-riding Mountiaq ute concept of 2019, preceded by the 2015 Funstar, based on the Fabia city hatch.
All three vehicles were one-offs created by apprentices at the Skoda Academy engineering and manufacturing school in Mlada Boleslav, the Czech Republic.
Alex Misoyannis has been writing about cars since 2017, when he started his own website, Redline. He contributed for Drive in 2018, before joining CarAdvice in 2019, becoming a regular contributing journalist within the news team in 2020. Cars have played a central role throughout Alex’s life, from flicking through car magazines at a young age, to growing up around performance vehicles in a car-loving family. Highly Commended - Young Writer of the Year 2024 (Under 30) Rising Star Journalist, 2024 Winner Scoop of The Year - 2024 Winner
