Five reasons to love and hate Lifan Smily

They say that if you see something that looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then this is a duck. But if something like the Mini flashes in the traffic, this does not mean that you actually saw the car of the famous British brand. It is possible that you caught a “Chinese” mimicking him by the name of Lifan Smily.
The Smily compact hatchback, belonging to the A segment, was first shown at the 2008 Beijing Motor Show. However, then he was called (and is still called) Lifan 320, and the name Smily was assigned to the model exclusively for the Russian market.
When someone says that Smily is a clone or a copy of Mini, this is at least not true. The car is really made with a big eye on the iconic minicar, but it is rather a “variation on the theme” than direct copying. Continue reading →