Friday, November 16, 2007

Chrysler Program Manager Hints at ORT (not SRT) Jeeps

Concept/Demonstration
Posted by mike on 2007/11/16 8:33:11 (106) reads

Steve Houtman, Program Manager - Jeep Performance/Dodge Off-Road Parts, recently posted an article on the official Chrysler LLC blog site that he's looking into starting an Off-Road Technology (ORT) program similar to Chrysler's SRT (street and racing technology).

I’ve spent a lot of my career advocating for more emphasis on our Jeep brand off-road customers. Several years ago, I was sitting at my colleague’s desk, and we got to talking. Why not do something like SRT on the Jeep side of the house? We could call it ORT for “Off-Road Technology.” Instead of big engines and big brakes, we’d put big lifts and big tires and sell these production vehicles to serious off-road customers at low volumes.

Our vice president, Craig Love, liked the idea. With his encouragement, we’ve been refining our idea and developing a business case to present to management, which we will do this month. Hopefully, our “ORT” idea will get kicked up to the next level. I’ll let readers know what happens. Hey, it was a group of enthusiasts got the Wrangler Rubicon started. So maybe, a group of enthusiasts can get this idea moving, as well.

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