Beijing Automotive Industry Holdings purchased Saab’s old 9-3 platform a couple of years ago with the intent to tweak the platform and produce a family sized sedan for the Chinese market.

At the recent 2011 Shanghai show, BAIC revealed a four door sedan based on that very platform and badged it the T60.

Its a concept vehicle for now but BAIC said it received a good response from the locals and that it will move the concept into production in 2012. Visually, you can see elements from all kinds of other automakers, such as Honda, Volvo and Lexus, but it does prove that other styles were possible on the old 9-3 platform.

The Beijing Auto T60 Sport Phantom, what a name!, is based on the Saab 9-3 platform and Beijing Auto’s first serious design on top of it. Beijing Auto bought the platforms for the Saab 9-3 and 9-5 back in 2009 just before Spyker bought the rest. Beijing Auto showed the 9-3 based C60 on the 2010 Beijing Auto Show but that was more a Saab with different badges. This T60 however is a different thing, very clean lines and modern enough for 2012, which is when the T60 is scheduled to hit the market. Engines from old Saab as well, 2.0 turbo and 2.3 turbo.

BAIC Motor’s own made car, the Saab-based T60, will begin production early next year, the Beijing News reported today. The vehicle debuted at the recently past Auto Shanghai 2011 in concept form.

The T60 concept (pictured above) was the work of famous Italian design house Pininfarina and borrows core design elements from the future Saab 9-3. According to BAIC President, Zhang Xin, although the technology used by the T60 concept was practical, the design itself would slightly differ from the production version. “The model made will have some differences with the officially produced version, [which we are] currently working on,” he said.

In related news, BAIC’s other own made car, the C70G, which is also built on a Saab design, is slated to begin production at the end of the year.