Renault put a stop to it
The petrol version of the Fiat Panda is now called Pandina, we learned this week. This means that the small Fiat has changed its name for the first time since 1980, but that was in danger of happening much earlier.
2003. The true Panda enthusiast will of course immediately know what happened that year: the original Panda went out of production and was succeeded by the much more modern five-door hatchback that served as the blueprint for the current model. That second generation is what today’s story is about. The new compact Fiat actually had nothing at all to do with the original Fiat Panda. It was presented as the successor to the Panda, but emphatically not as a Panda. It was long assumed that the car would be called ‘Simba’, after the concept car that preceded it.
The Fiat Simba concept car from 2002
At the Geneva Motor Show it was announced that the new A-segment car would not be called Simba, but Fiat Gingo. Only in July 2003, a few months before the Dutch market introduction, was the Fiat Gingo renamed Fiat Panda. Why? Renault thought ‘Gingo’ looked too much like ‘Twingo’, and was apparently right. Until this week, the smallest Fiat would be called Panda and is now only changing to ‘Pandina’ because the Panda name is being stuck on a new electric car. Still another name, but not ‘Gingo’.
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl