A spokesman for Jaguar has told Automotive News Europe that it has "...bold plans for the future, the next stage of which will be revealed at the Frankfurt show."
"We are likely to have a concept car to announce there," added the Jaguar spokesman.
Speculation is rife as to what the concept car will be, but there's a growing body of evidence to suggest it will be a small sports car that would slot in underneath the XK sports coupe, potentially called the XE.
Several photos of a Porsche Cayman-sized Jaguar donning XK camouflage have been snapped by spy photographers in Europe and America in the past couple of months, and though design guru Ian Callum ruled out a new generation E-Type at the Geneva motor show earlier in the year, he did hint that "more exciting stuff" was on the way.
Jaguar celebrated the 50th anniversary of the original E-Type this year with festivities at the 2011 Geneva motor show back in March, but even if the new sports car concept doesn't bear the E-Type name, the links between them will invariably be made - especially if it's badged with the initials XE.
While Jaguar currently offers the XF, XK and XJ models that compete in similar market segments to offerings from Mercedes-Benz and BMW, Jag's small sports car would battle it out with the Porsche Cayman, and is likely to be powered by tweaked versions of Jaguar's 3.0-litre V6 petrol engines.
"We are investigating other areas of the market past the current XF, XJ and XK ranges," noted the Jag spokesman. "If business is going to grow, we've got to look beyond those markets."
Jaguar confirmed to motoring.com.au in July 2011 that it is developing a wagon variant of the XF and the Jaguar Land Rover group has made no secret of its aggressive growth strategy, planning 40 major vehicle updates, including new vehicles, to be launched in the next five years.
On the local front, Jaguar Australia's brand manager Kevin Goult told motoring.com.au that it's policy was not to comment on "future product plans" but added that "As with all Jaguar products, Jaguar Australia will review the business case for introduction into the market for retail."
However Goult hinted that Australia would likely pick up all products released globally, which bodes well for any future sports cars: "...we currently retail all global Jaguar products in the Australian market ... and the Jaguar CX75 will be available in the Australian market for retail."
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