Mercedes-AMG chief Tobias Moers revealed that they will be developing a replacement for their existing 2.0-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine. The exec hinted in his interview with Australia’s Motoring website that the new unit will be more compact, and it will possess a higher output.

Moers said the engineers of Mercedes-AMG High Performance Powertrains (HPP) will be working on the next-generation power unit. It should be noted that the mentioned people were the ones responsible in creating the present petrol hybrid V6 engine of the Silver Arrow race cars under Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team.

The source pointed out that the engineers specialize in both advanced Energy Recovery System (ERS) and Kinetic Energy Recovery System (KERS) technology. It speculates that their expertise will allow them to downsize the unit from 2.0-liter to 1.6-liter.

Moers mentioned that the new turbo engine will power the future AMG models under the A-Class, B-Class, CLA, and GLA. He pointed out that their decision to develop a new power unit was due to the current 2.0-liter turbo engine already reaching its peak configuration. He explained they already squeezed everything that they could to allow the unit to reach its maximum output, which is at 280 kW with 475 Nm of torque.

The Mercedes-AMG boss told the source though that they won’t be integrating E-boost or electric-driven turbochargers in the upcoming engine similar to what Audi had heavily invested in. He said the limitations of the technology in terms of power does not make it a priority for the company at the moment.