Geely at Shanghai 2011: Geely MINI Cooper & Geely London Taxi

Geely's take on the London Cab & MINI Cooper

Regular readers – in fact anyone who takes notice of car news – will probably recognise Geely as being the Chinese car maker who bought Volvo in 2010.

Proper car anoraks may also remember the ‘Chinese Rolls Royce‘, a Phantom ‘Homage’ from Geely that came equipped with a ‘Throne’ in the back to transport a lone plutocrat. It looked a lot like a Russian cold war ZIL meets cartoon Phantom and there was no mistaking it was a Chinese car for a Chinese market.

But now the lines are starting to blur a little more as Geely, and other Chinese car makers and designers too, start to soak up the influence of the West and their offerings start to look more mainstream. In fact, some of them start to look rather good, despite the sometimes obvious influence.

You wouldn’t have to be an expert in car design to work out that the Geely Emgrand EC6-RV is a MINI Cooper with a few lines smoothed out. It comes with the choice of a pair of petrol 4-pots – a 1.5 litre normally aspirated or a 1.3 litre turbo – and really looks rather good. Although we’re sure BMW – who partner with Brilliance in China – won’t be thrilled.

Nor would you need help to work out that the Geely Englon SC7-RV is a London Taxi. But here there’s less reason to cast aspersions with this new Geely offering,  as Geely bought up London Taxis International last year and they’re entitled to do whatever they want with the design, and any derivatives they care to churn out. That said, we think this Geely Taxi for the masses has a similar sort of appeal to the Nissan Cube or Kia Soul.

And is it just us, or do the names of these two cars - Englon and Emgrand – sound like a Chinese version of England?

By Cars UK