Uploaded July 2021 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

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The doo wop sound of the 40s and 50s was honed by American teenagers on street corners, trying to one-up each other to become the greatest group in town. This friendly rivalry, also seen in Chinese cafés as electronics engineers try to produce increasingly optimised circuits, is also seen in the German car industry. If Audi’s navigation system uses real-time traffic information, BMW’s system has to have it, yesterday! It was in this highly competitive environment that Mercedes tried to one-up its German rivals with the revolutionary Mercedes A-class. A false floor raised the seating height, producing the interior space of a Mercedes C-Class in something shorter than a Ford Ka. No one had done anything like this before, and the A-Class was in a class of its own. So why did Mercedes abandon this revolutionary design, going back to the same tried-and-tested shape?

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Sources:
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_A-Klasse
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_A-Class
motor1.com/news/74281/concept-we-forgot-1981-mercedes-benz-nafa
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Konzeptfahrzeuge_von_Mercedes-Benz#NAFA
media.daimler.com/marsMediaSite/en/instance/ko/Milestones-of-Innovation-at-Mercedes-Benz.xhtml?oid=9272377
autoexpress.co.uk/mercedes/a-class/36923/mercedes-a-class
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_der_Konzeptfahrzeuge_von_Mercedes-Benz#Studie_A
web.archive.org/web/20070930062900/http://w210.ub.uni-tuebingen.de/dbt/volltexte/2003/746/pdf/Druckfassung_08_04_03.2003.pdf
mercedesblog.com/fcc-concept-mercedes-benzs-affordable-family-car-china
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_Baureihe_168
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_A-Class_(W177)
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_(Automarke)#Modelle_und_Markteinf%C3%BChrung
umweltbrief.de/pdf/Mercedes_A-class_electric_zebra.pdf
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_NECAR
welt.de/motor/article1280688/Mercedes-und-der-Elch-Die-perfekte-Blamage.html
https://www.autodaily.com.au/flashback-mercedes-benz-a38-amg-twin-engine/
supercars.net/blog/2002-mercedes-benz-a32k-amg
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_Vaneo
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_Baureihe_169
automobile-catalog.com/make/mercedes-amg/176_a_amg/a_w176_1_5d_amg/2013.html
automobile-catalog.com/make/mercedes-benz/176_a_class/a_w176_1_5d/2013.html
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_W_176
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_A-Class_(W177)
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_Baureihe_177

Music in the middle of the video: "Yung Logos" by "Papov" from the YouTube library.
Last Kiss Goodnight by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
Source: incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html?isrc=USUAN1100611
Artist: incompetech.com

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