So he is finally stepping down after presiding over some of the craziest decisions in the motor industry. To name a few:

Deciding Alfa will go rear wheel drive when any berk could tell him the natural competitor is Audi.

Creating some of the ugliest Fiats ever with the 500L and X (not to mention the Doblo and Qubo).

Re badging Lancias as Chryslers - what the hell?

And his unforgivable neglect of Fiat as a maker of family cars. There is no sign of a Punto replacement and the Tipo is going the way of Bravo and Stilo before it due to non existent marketing. Tipos should be selling like hot cakes in Europe. Try looking for a VW/Audi 5 seater with 120bhp and see what you have to pay. For the price of a Tipo T Jet they might offer you a 75bhp Polo.

Apparently he has said he sees no future for Fiat except at 500 level and even then he is not sure about that. So the future of Fiat looks likely to have no Fiats in it.

Well I must say I'd never even heard of a Tipo before joining the forum and only seen an occasional bravo around

A few points though I agree with the sentiment of the post.

jim cooper said:

Deciding Alfa will go rear wheel drive when any berk could tell him the natural competitor is Audi.

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RWD and Alfa are the perfect combination, people associate Italian cars with passion and to be a drivers or enthusiast car. Rear wheel drives give flare and excitement when driven hard. For years Alfa knocked out FWD cars which didn't sell and didn't provoke any feelings of excitement or passion.

jim cooper said:

Creating some of the ugliest Fiats ever with the 500L and X (not to mention the Doblo and Qubo).

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Agree all except the 500X which showed some intelligent thought when it came to design, the 500L lacked any charisma so the 500x was a significant improvement.

jim cooper said:

Re badging Lancias as Chryslers - what the hell?

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Otherway round, they stuck Lancia badges on existing Chrisler models, the only true lancia in the bunch was the Ypsilon which they designed specifically to carry a Chrysler badge using styling specific to chrysler cars.

The Ypisilon is the only remaining Lancia model and soon to be phased out while the lancia name dies ( another of Sergio's great ideas)

jim cooper said:

And his unforgivable neglect of Fiat as a maker of family cars. There is no sign of a Punto replacement and the Tipo is going the way of Bravo and Stilo before it due to non existent marketing. Tipos should be selling like hot cakes in Europe. Try looking for a VW/Audi 5 seater with 120bhp and see what you have to pay. For the price of a Tipo T Jet they might offer you a 75bhp Polo.

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People spending the sort of money you would pay for a VW or an Audi (especially Audi) won't be looking at buying a fiat. Fiat is positioned more in the Ford, vauxhall and korean brand makers, even then they can't compete, for example the Cee'd is about the same money as the Tipo but comes with a 7 year warranty and a lot more kit for your money. An Audi A3 would be about £5 - 8k more than a tipo.

jim cooper said:

Apparently he has said he sees no future for Fiat except at 500 level and even then he is not sure about that. So the future of Fiat looks likely to have no Fiats in it.

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He seems to get fixated on chasing the money, if a car sells well he forgets everything else. At the moment they have realised that Jeep is a very big seller for them in other parts of the world as is the Chrysler brand, along with prestige brands like alfa and Maserati.

What the likes of VW do is filter down the technologies from their premium cars to the cheaper models allowing them to offer a lot more, so Whatever top technology you can buy on your Audi A8 today, you will be able to find in a SEAT Ibiza in a few years time, that also means their cheaper cars are often more reliable as they have longer tested Tech, Fiat don't get this model and they operate all there different subdivisions separately, the New Alfa's are almost developed from the ground up, Maserati does not have any components in common with any fiat.

On the other hand you'll Find Audi bits in your Lamborghini, Bugatti tech in Bentley's and even some VW's, it allows them to test new things out in the real world and continually develop while keeping costs down. Fiat on the other hand are burning through R&D money like it's going out of fashion.

Even Rolls Royce (bmw owned) has been known to use tech in the Mini before it's used in the Rolls, the main example of this is infotainment systems which can be easily customised with software for specific brands but can be given a full work down in everyday cars to iron out any bumps before giving them to a more discerning cliental.

Now the world is leaving fiat behind with electric and hybrid cars, the best fiat managed was the 500e which cost the company a fortune for every car they sold, but was essential to be able to sell cars in certain parts of America

Well, forget Audi. What about Skoda. An Octavia is upwards of £17000 and comes with any problems that VW have dreamed up. The Tipo t jet has a wonderful engine, as does the standard model with 95bhp, yet the Octavia is over us like a rash.

My own 12 year old Stilo 1.4 star jet is the best car I have ever owned - 100,000 miles with no problems and not a drop of oil on the driveway. The electrics are superb and the paintwork and interior trim like new. A great compliment to the quality of output from the Cassino plant.

jim cooper said:

Well, forget Audi. What about Skoda. An Octavia is upwards of £17000 and comes with any problems that VW have dreamed up.

My own 12 year old Stilo 1.4 star jet is the best car I have ever owned - 100,000 miles with no problems and not a drop of oil on the driveway.

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If you compare like for like then you’d put the tipo against the fabia which on paper is around the same price as the tipo and in some models considerably cheaper.
The Octavia on the other hand is a larger family car and loved by taxi drivers for their ability to do 200,000 miles without breaking a sweat, my brother has an Octavia which he used as a taxi before he started his own business 4 years ago, it’s done over 260k and he begrudges getting rid because there is nothing really wrong with it. My father also has a 2004 Octavia still which again has nothing wrong with despite 170k on the clock, it outlasted his Volvo which he replaced recently due to the Volvo needing in his words ‘too much doing to it”

I know people on here don’t like it being pointed out that VAG cars are in anyway better then fiat, and I’m not stating now that they are, but when thousands of taxi drivers up and down the country swear by them people tend to take notice. Fiat don’t have any sort of comparison in terms of reputation, and so people will buy Skoda over Fiat all day everyday.

I wouldn't say the Fabia was equivalent to a Tipo. The Tipo is the same size as my Stilo, if not bigger, and has far more room and boot space than a Fabia.

I realize the Octavia is very popular but it has had at least two serious failings which originate with VW. First there was the fiasco with failed cam chains, resulting in abandonment of that format in favour of a belt (it has been reported that VW pressed the chain supplier so heavily on price that he couldn't afford to re tool in order to meet the required spec). Secondly there were problems with the DSG gearbox. Neither of these remarkable engineering deficiencies has dented the myth of VW reliability. In contrast Fiat have suffered no such embarrassments in the Stilo/Bravo/Tipo sector.

If people are looking at buying a small car they are unlikely to go bigger for the Octavia, the Octavia is about the same degree bigger than the tipo, than the tipo is to the fabia, for a true like for like comparison you’d need to look at the rapide.

That said these are not the main competitors for the tipo, you’ve ignored the focus, astra, as well as Kia Hyundai and other Korean brands.

The perceived reliability of any car is far stronger than the true reliability, people’s overall view of fiats is that they are less reliable than their German counterparts, you can come up with all manor of arguments to the contrary but that isn’t going to make a massive dent in people’s perception right or wrong.

It’s also worth noting that fiat have had plenty of problems with their own automatic gearboxes you don’t need to spend long here to work that out, also they have seen a fair few problems with their cam chains in 1.3 engines. VW re-engineered the problem parts, Fiat just left it. VW will change a DSG gearbox well outside of warranty (a friend of mine had theirs changed at 5 years old) where as fiat won’t give you a free air freshener out of waranty.

Rather than trying to compare one car with the tipo you need to look at the problems facing the tipo, overall.

I suspect the tipo sells well in other countries and it wasn’t really made for the uk market