Der neue Volkswagen Passat

The Volkswagen Passat B8 has been voted the 2015 European Car of the Year by a panel of 58 motoring journalists from 22 countries on the Continent, a day before the 2015 Geneva show opened its doors to the press.

Racking up a total of 340 points, the new D-segmenter overtook nominees such as the Citroen C4 Cactus (248 points), Mercedes C-Class (221), Ford Mondeo (203), Nissan Qashqai (160), BMW 2 Series Active Tourer (154) and Renault Twingo (124), to collect the coveted crown.

"We are extremely proud of this accolade," said Volkswagen CEO Prof Martin Winterkorn. "This honour is a tremendous confirmation for the work of our engineers, designers and the entire team. The new Passat shows that the Volkswagen brand has the right answers to the challenges of our time."

This is the third VW to bag the European accolade in the recent past - the Golf won it in 2013 (it was also World Car of the same year) and the Polo, in 2010. The new Peugeot 308 was last year's winner.

The eighth-gen Volkswagen Passat made an appearance in Malaysia only five months after its world reveal in July 2014, and will probably be introduced here towards year-end. Excited yet?

Volkswagen Passat B8 at Das Event in Malaysia