Renault design boss Laurens van den Acker is planning a show concept for 2016 that he expects to be as influential on Renault’s future as the 2010 DeZir electric coupé, one which will shape the company's future design direction

The DeZir set the design direction of the company’s two best-sellers of recent years, the Clioand Captur.

Van den Acker said that the type of car can’t yet be revealed but that by the time the wraps come off it, a new Megane – and, more important, a Mégane-based SUV – will be in the frame.

Meanwhile, he cited the ultra-low-carbon Eolab hybrid concept, shown at the recent Paris show under a French government-sponsored economy car scheme also embraced by PSA Peugeot-Citroën, as giving clues to a future Clio. 

“You can drive this car,” he said. “It has been created with a large amount of input from engineers and it works already, despite being 100mm narrower in the rear track for aerodynamic reasons. This is a car we could produce for 2018,” he revealed. 

“All of its innovations – the aero, the carbonfibre doors, the magnesium roof and a lot more – could be made now. But we need time to put them all into the industrial process,” he said.