China To Get 250 Horsepower Version Of 718 Boxster/Cayman

China is an expensive place to buy a foreign car thanks to tariffs on imports. This is why many automakers outside of China set up joint-ventures with Chinese ones to avoid them. Porsche is trying another way to make their vehicles less expensive by offering less power.

Automotive News Europe reports that the German sports car builder will be offering a 250 horsepower version of the 718 Boxster and Cayman for 600,000 Yuan (about $90,000 at the time of this writing). The 600,000 price tag is "a magical threshold for customers in China," according to Jan Roth, head of the Porsche 718 line.

"A lot of the TTs that Audi sells in China, the smaller displacement 1.8-liter versions with rear wheel instead of all-wheel-drive, are priced below that, Mercedes too," (Author's note: The base Audi TT is front-wheel drive and not rear-wheel drive. We're guessing this was missed in editing or lost in translation. -WM)

Roth says this new variant could nearly double sales of the 718 Boxster and Cayman in China - 2,500 in 2015 to 4,500 in 2017.

Source: Automotive News Europe (Subscription Required)