Executive: Maybach needs better products, design

04/30/07, 07:29pm, EDT

LEFTLANENEWS - - DaimlerChrysler's efforts to create a new super-luxury brand yielded the return of the long dead Maybach nameplate and high hopes. As if Daimler needed another headache besides the ongoing Chrysler drama, its got one in Maybach. It's not the brand, one executive told Automobile Magazine, its the product.

"Everyone involved knows now that it's not the brand that's at fault," claims the company source. "It's the current product in general and the design in particular." The executive said the boldly designed Exelero concept "did more for us than all the tweaks to the 57/62 series combined," suggesting aggressive designs could save the brand.

The super-luxury brand hasn't met sales expectations and is looking to a rebadged Mercedes GL-Class as its potential savior in the short term. Ultimately the brand would like to develop a high-end four-door coupe, based off the S-Class platform. The CLS-like vehicle would be longer, wider, more luxurious, and obviously much more expensive than the Mercedes coupe.

The uber-CLS would feature exterior lighting to highlight certain body contours, a variable-tint glass roof, and an LCD gauge cluster that changes based on conditions.