By 1987 AMC was done. Chrysler acquired American Motors in a deal that many believed was engineered to gain the desirable Jeep nameplate, but there were other elements of the deal that Chrysler ended up gaining from. The 1993 LH platform cars (Chrysler Concorde, Dodge Intrepid, Eagle Vision and the cancelled Plymouth Accolade) were derived from the work that AMC and Renault had put into their final joint project, the Premier. Sold as the Renault Premier for a half-second before being rebadged as the Eagle Premier, and later being branded as the Dodge Monaco in order to sell some cars (which didn’t happen), the 1988-92 Premier platform was considered a dismal failure…but it wasn’t, because Chrysler got the Bramalea plant that was built for the Premier, the rear disc brake setup that was put unchanged into the Dodge Viper, and the LH cars got the north-south front-wheel-drive design.

The Premier actually had a lot going for it: it was more aerodynamic than a Ford Taurus, it was light (under 3,000 pounds) and was well-optioned. AMC really fought to make this Giugiaro-designed sedan work, but they had big plans: in addition to the Premier, a station wagon and a two-door coupe were planned. The wagon probably isn’t worth missing, but the coupe, code-named X-59 and known in the press as the “Allure”, is enough of a “what-if” to mention: if produced, the Allure would have had the same north-south front-wheel-drive layout as the Premier/LH cars, which meant that a rear-drive version was possible. Renault’s 2.5L V6 was the standard, but late in the game the Mitsubishi 3.0L V6 that Chrysler used was stuffed into Premiers and Monacos, but with the rear-drive platform, this could have been Chrysler’s way to get back at the Ford Mustang and Chevrolet Camaro: a roomy two-door, rear-drive coupe that was slick but didn’t look like a potato. Shame to think what could have been…

Source: planetrenault.com