We are finally seeing a genuine "World car" here. Ford tried with the first Focus, with limited success, but there were a massive amount of differences between the European market cars and those sold in North America. In this case, it appears that the car has been designed from the start to meet the legislative criteria of most of its' intended markets without so many specific modifications.
Another interesting point is that whilst a D-segment car is the average size of a car in Europe, it's considered small in places like Australia and the U.S. I wonder how long it will be before the current craze for being "green" and the increasing price of fuel will affect the size of vehicles that consumers actually purchase.
I totally agree Peter. There are some nice / different design touches in there, but there's no consistency and they don't gel together as a whole - it's almost as if someone photoshopped those images using various parts from lots of different cars...and the interior is just as bad - it's a mess and it'd take hours to find some of the more minor controls it's so busy in there.
And I know I keep mentioning it...but why the hell do the designers keep sticking HUGE grilles on the front of new designs now? The nose looks like a cross between an angry dragon from a Japanese cartoon and Gordon Ramsay's orgasm face. The new Astra and Golf don't look like this.
I take it you mean "for the American market"? - If so, see my answer below.
From reading the info in the original post, I think this design is intended as a World Car (to replace the current versions of the Focus in both Europe AND North America). The current NA Focus looks, to be frank, rubbish, and the European one is due for replacement anyway (partly because the competition has clearly surpassed it).