There’s a method — and a business plan — behind the apparent madness.

More details are slowly emerging about Fiat Chrysler’s (OTC: FIATY) upcoming supercharged muscle car, the 2015 Dodge Challenger SRT “Hellcat.”

We still don’t know how much horsepower it’ll have (“over 600,” says Chrysler) or how much it’ll cost (“over $50,000,” says common sense.)

But we do know a few more things: It’ll sound really mean, it’ll be loaded with high-tech features, and it’ll be a key part of Fiat Chrysler’s plan to reposition the 100-year-old Dodge brand.

It’s more than just a hot new model
Let’s take that last one first: The snarling red Challenger that made the YouTube rounds this past week isn’t just a fun product, it’s an important part of a larger business plan.

Fiat and Chrysler completed their long-awaited merger (except for a few ongoing legal details) earlier this year. The combined company released its five-year business plan earlier this month.

It’s a complicated plan, with a lot of moving parts. That’s not a surprise: Turning two struggling regional automakers into a thriving global powerhouse will take a lot of work.

But one big part of that plan, at least from an American perspective, is the reworking of the Dodge brand. Dodge has long been Chrysler’s mainstream consumer brand, but that’s changing: Now, the Chrysler brand will sell the minivans and family sedans, while Dodge concentrates on one of its historical strengths: High performance.

There’s a method to Fiat Chrysler’s madness, here. The age of a Dodge buyer is lower than that of key mainstream-market rivals — six years younger on average, Dodge says. Fiat Chrysler’s leaders think that’s because of the brand’s high-performance image, and they want to build on that image in a big way.

ALSO READ: America’s Hottest Selling Cars

Why? You may have heard that today’s young adults aren’t as interested in cars as their forebears. That’s not just talk, there’s a lot of data to support it. Winning younger buyers is a key challenge for all automakers right now — and a constant struggle.

In Dodge, with its muscle-car history, Fiat Chrysler thinks they have an advantage — one they’re determined to build on over the next five years.

That’s where the “Hellcat” comes in.

A brand-builder as well as a profit-maker
We should clarify: “Hellcat” is Chrysler’s internal name for a brand-new engine, but it may become an official name. It’s a new supercharged 6.2-liter version of Chrysler’s Hemi V8, optimized for high performance. Chrysler hasn’t yet told us how much power it’ll make, but officials have promised “over 600” horsepower and “over 575” pound-feet of torque.

The Hellcat engine will debut in the top-of-the line version of the refreshed for 2015 Dodge Challenger. That car is expected to run with the hottest coupes from Chrysler’s traditional Detroit rivals, as well as with some high-powered imports like BMW’s (OTC: BAMXF) new M3 sedan.

It’s also expected to be priced similarly, certainly over $50,000, and most will likely go out the door with a sticker price over $60,000. You get a lot for that price: Chrysler said this week that Hellcat-equipped Challengers will come standard with a host of safety and luxury equipment that is optional on lower-priced models, including HID headlights, advanced adaptive cruise control, and Chrysler’s well-regarded UConnect touchscreen infotainment system.

That’s not exactly a youth-market price. But this isn’t exactly a youth-market product — at least, not directly. The Hellcat-powered Challenger is a classic “halo” car, one that elevates the image of the rest of the product line.

For Fiat Chrysler, the car’s existence is as much about marketing this new idea of the Dodge brand as a serious maker of high-performance vehicles as it is about the (probably substantial) profits it will make on each sale.

One step in a long-term effort
Fiat Chrysler really is serious about reworking the Dodge brand. The midsize Dodge Avenger family sedan has already been discontinued, and the long-lived Grand Caravan minivan will come to the end of its road in 2016.

Other current Dodge products like the compact Dart and Journey crossover will be reworked to “better align with [the new] Dodge Brand DNA,” Dodge chief Tim Kuniskis said earlier this month.

Meanwhile, the Challenger gets a Hellcat. Its big brother, the Charger sedan, is also expected to get the new supercharged Hemi early next year — giving the Dodge brand two prominent “halo” muscle cars to go with its hyper-rare (and hyper-expensive, at least by Dodge standards) Viper sports car.

They aren’t exactly new models. The Charger arrived in 2005 and the Challenger in 2008, though both have been considerably reworked and updated since, and of course, the model names and some key styling elements date to Dodge’s muscle-car heyday over 40 years ago.

But here in 2014, and for at least the next few years, those are the cars will form the backbone of the Dodge brand, at least in spirit, going forward.

 

Special free report: Top dividend stocks for the next decade
The smartest investors know that dividend stocks simply crush their non-dividend paying counterparts over the long term. That’s beyond dispute. They also know that a well-constructed dividend portfolio creates wealth steadily, while still allowing you to sleep like a baby. Knowing how valuable such a portfolio might be, our top analysts put together a report on a group of high-yielding stocks that should be in any income investor’s portfolio. To see our free report on these stocks, just click here now.

Thank you for reading! Have some feedback for us?
Contact the 24/7 Wall St. editorial team.